Gardens of the Loire Valley

Expect the unexpected: Chaumont’s adventurous garden festival is a must whether you’re a plant lover or interested in horticultural design. Far from the conventional vision of sedate floral displays, here artists, designers and architects as well as landscape gardeners create gardens that range from the ingenious to the crazy.

Held in the grounds of a stunning chateau overlooking the Loire, there’s always plenty to inspire. Yearly themes have ranged from weeds and colour to eroticism.

The 55-hectare grounds at this lovely 16th-century chateau contain a selection of horticultural delights. Cooks and gardeners will be fascinated by the kitchen garden, which includes 150 vegetables and a remarkable ‘conservatoire’ of almost 630 varieties of tomato collected by ‘gardener prince’, Prince Louis Albert de Broglie.

There’s also ‘Dahliacour’, a contemporary garden filled with a hundred varieties of dahlias, a medicinal plant garden, an orchard with 76 fruit trees, and collections of cedar, redwood, chestnut, and oak trees.

A fairytale castle of medieval architecture straight from a storybook, with 14 superb, sculpture-strewn gardens and its own wine.

Considered by some to be the world’s most beautiful garden, the grounds of this UNESCO-listed chateau are a must-see.

Created and owned by the Carvallo family, the terraced Renaissance gardens include an ornamental garden, with sculptured hedges, a medicinal herb garden, and a tranquil water garden.

The undisputed star of the show, however, is the stupendous kitchen garden, transformed into a geometrical feast of cabbages and pumpkins, zigzags of leeks, patches of peppers and other colourful vegetables.

This 29-hectare, Edo-inspired Japanese garden was first created in the early 1900s by the noted Parisian architect and fervent Orientalist Alexandre Marcel, and is an unlikely, but welcome surprise in the Loire Valley.

The largest Japanese garden in Europe, with over 300 species, it’s beautifully laid out with rolling lawns, a large lake, sculpted trees, picturesque red bridges, pagoda and shinto shrines, with numerous plants symbolising the different ages of man. There’s also a compelling permanent exhibition showcasing the ancient Japanese art of bonsai.

On Saturdays and some Wednesdays in summer, visitors, armed with Chinese lanterns, can participate in a captivating 1.5-hour guided night walk of the garden.

The park was originally created for the owner of the grandiose Château Colbert next door – now a hotel and a stylish spot for lunch or dinner.

This unique theme park – Europe’s first devoted exclusively to plant life – opened its doors in April 2010.

Its multiple attractions and presentations provide an already dazzling display of horticulture: 17 hectares, 275,000 tropical trees and plants from all continents – including 2,000 orchids and giant vegetables – nurtured by 20 full-time gardeners.

Radiating from a central piazza are four themed areas: the Desired (exotic, sought after plants), the Generous (plants that supply us with food, medicines, shelter and so on), the Mysterious (secrets of the plant world) and the Tamed (domestic plants).

There’s a balloon ride, a boat ride and a ride in a nutshell. The 4D film room explains all there is to know about the process of photosynthesis, following the exciting adventure of two drops of water.

The ideal mix of the entertaining and the educational for all ages – and even for those who usually avoid the garden.