RHS Garden, Wisley
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The Royal Horticultural Society's garden at Wisley in the English county of Surrey south of London, is one of the three most visited paid gardens in the United Kingdom alongside Kew Gardens and Alnwick Garden. It is one of four public gardens run by the Society.
Wisley was founded by Victorian businessman and RHS member George Ferguson Wilson, who purchased a 60 acre (243,000 m²) site in 1878. He established the "Oakwood Experimental Garden" on part of the site, where he attempted to "make difficult plants grow successfully". Wilson died in 1902 and Oakwood and the adjoining Glebe Farm were purchased by Sir Thomas Hanbury, the creator of the celebrated garden La Mortola on the Italian Riviera. He gifted both sites to the RHS the following year. Since then Wisley has developed steadily and it is now is a large and diverse garden covering 240 acres (971,000 m²). In addition to numerous formal and informal decorative gardens, several glasshouses and an extensive arboretum, it includes small scale "model gardens" which are intended to show visitors what they can achieve in their own gardens, and a trials field where new cultivars are assessed.
In April 2005 Alan Titchmarsh cut the turf to mark the start of construction of the Bicentenary Glasshouse. This major new feature will cover three quarters of an acre (3,000 m²) and will overlook a new lake, this is also being built. It will be divided into three main planting zones representing desert, tropical and temperate climates. It is budgeted at £7.7 million and is expected to open in 2007.
