Ashland, the Henry Clay Estate: 120
Sycamore Road,
Lexington, KY 40502 (859)266-8581.
- The gardens are but a glorious
remnant of the original 600 acre estate, yet are true to the tastes of Ashland's
first owners, Henry and Lucretia Clay. The formal garden, a six parterre garden,
features boxwood hedges and roses, while a second garden showcases hybrid
peonies.
Bernheim Arboretum and Research
Forest: State Highway 245 (14 miles west of Bardstown, across from the Jim
Beam Distillery),
Clermont, KY 40110 (502)955-8512.
- Two thousand acres of the 14,000 acres are open to the public with 20 miles of hiking paths,
of which 250 acres is an Olmstead-designed arboretum exhibiting over 18,000
plants (1,800 labeled) and 15 acres of gardens. Special collections includes
hollies, beech, conifers, nut trees, crabapples and ginkgoes. The Quiet Garden,
perennials, works of sculpture, a water lily pond, a small nature museum,
animal, game and turtle pens, a labeled nature trail and a waterfowl refuge are
further attractions.
Big Bone Gardens: Kentucky 338 (across from Big Bone
Lick State Park),
Union, KY (859) 384-1949.
- This six acre private garden,
including seven water gardens, herb gardens, a gnome garden and other theme
gardens, is generously open to the public on weekends during the growing season.
Boone County Arboretum: 9190 Camp
Ernst Road,
Union, KY 41091 (859) 384-4999.
- The Arboretum encompasses 121 acres
with over 2 miles of paved walking trails winding through the collection of
2,700 trees and shrubs. Special attractions include the Children's Garden,
Butterfly Garden, Trial Gardens, a Wildlife Viewing area in the Native Kentucky
Prairie, and a new Woodland Walking Trail. Broadmoor Gardens and
Conservatory: US 60 East, Irvington, KY 40146 (270)547-4200. A visit to the
Kukenhoff Gardens in Holland was the inspiration for this lovely and varied
garden, which includes water gardens, a tropical plant conservatory, a rock
garden, animal topiaries, an iris garden, a lily garden, an all-white moon
garden and a two-mile trail through wildflower meadows.
Brown-Pusey House and
Cunningham Garden: 128 North Main,
Elizabethtown, KY 42701 (270)765-2515.
- General Custer slept at this fine example of Federal architecture. The
landscaped garden in the rear of the house was a gift to the community.
Buffalo Trace Distillery: 113 Great Buffalo Trace,
Frankfort, KY 40601 (502)696-5926
-
Lovely gardens, designed by Albert Blandon, one of the Presidents of the company, grace the distillery grounds.
Farmington: 3033 Bardstown
Road,
Louisville, KY 40205 (502)452-9920.
- Abraham Lincoln slept at this historic
plantation, designed by Thomas Jefferson.
Floral Clock:
West Lawn, State Capitol Grounds, Capitol Avenue,
Frankfort,
KY 40601 (502)564-3449.
- 13,000 Alternanthera and Santolina foliage plants decorate the
face of this remarkable attraction. The planter is 34 feet in diameter and
weighs 200,000 pounds. The minute hand is 20½ feet long and weighs 530 pounds
while the hour hand is 15½ feet long and weighs 420 pounds. Time weighs heavy in
Frankfort!
Hunt Morgan House:
201 N. Mill Street,
Lexington, KY 40507 (859)233-3290.
- This Federal-style house
is a living museum representing the days when Lexington was known as the "Athens
of the West" for its highly cultured lifestyle. A small "city" garden with a
bridge gazebo graces the premises.
Lexington Cemetery: 833 West Main Street,
Lexington, KY 40508
(859)255-5522.
- This 170 nationally recognized arboretum and cemetery, serving as
a public park in the late 1800s, features a sunken garden and a three-acre
flower garden. The tree walk features 42 of the 200 different species of trees
found within the grounds.
Liberty Hall
Historic Site: 218 Wilkinson Street,
Frankfort, KY 40601 (502)227-2560.
- The
grounds of this elegant Federal-style mansion contain the largest formal boxwood
garden in Kentucky. Comprising nearly 3 acres, it showcases beautiful perennial
and annual borders.
Locust Grove
Historic Home Museum: 561 Blankenbaker Lane,
Louisville, KY 40207
(502)897-9845.
- This 1790 Georgian mansion situated on 55 rolling acres up river
from Louisville, showcases elegant formal quadrant gardens, cutting gardens and
an herb garden.
Mary Todd
Lincoln House: 578 West Main,
Lexington, KY 40501 (859)233-9999.
- This
late-Georgian-style brick house, where Abraham Lincoln's future wife was raised,
displays a newly created period formal garden with perennials and herbs.
McDowell House Apothecary and Gardens:
125 South 2nd Street,
Danville, KY 40422 (859)236-2804.
- The home of a pioneer
apothecary includes, naturally, medicinal herb gardens and a wildflower garden.
My Old Kentucky Home
State Park: 501 E. Stephen Foster Avenue,
Bardstown, KY 40004-0323
(502)348-3502.
- Stephen Foster visited his cousins at this stately
1818 mansion and wrote the ballad for which this park is named. The
beautiful grounds (285 acres) include formal gardens.
Mystic Waters and Gardens at Honeysuckle Cottage: 4002 US 60 East,
Marion, KY 42064. (270)704-1027.
- Surrounding Honeysuckle Cottage, a rental lodging, this 3 acre cottage garden with 2 water features
and unique plantings is located on a working farm.
Nannine Clay Wallis
Arboretum: 616 Pleasant Street,
Paris, KY 40361 (859)987-6158.
- The Garden
Club of Kentucky is headquartered at this four-acre arboretum. Seventy varieties
of trees, including many varieties of flowering dogwoods, a fish pool, a rose
garden and numerous flowering plants grace the site.
Pinecrest
Cottage and Gardens: 2806 Newburg Road,
Louisville, KY 40205
(502)454-3800.
- This inn, on a 6.5 acre oasis in the city, offers 200 year old
trees, 3 ponds, a Japanese garden, a hosta collection featuring over 125
varieties, and numerous perennials.
Scotts County Native
Plants Arboretum: Main Street and Giddings Drive,
Georgetown College,
Georgetown,
KY (502)863-7063.
- This half acre garden emphasizing native flora displays formal
perennial gardens that include a butterfly and hummingbird garden, a prairie and
savanna garden, a prairie medicinals garden and a woodland medicinals garden.
Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill:
3501 Lexington Road,
Harrodsburg, KY 40330 (800)734-5611.
- This restored Shaker
community, consisting of 33 restored buildings and 2,800 acres of original land,
exhibits herb and vegetable gardens as they might have been in the 19th century.
University of Kentucky
Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government Arboretum: Alumni Drive,
Lexington, KY 40506-0033 (859)257-6955.
- The 100-acre site includes a 2 acre home
demonstration garden (ornamental and edible plants), the Walk Across Kentucky (a
two-mile trail displaying native flora of the seven physiographic areas of
Kentucky), a rose garden (with over 500 rose bushes of numerous varieties and
ornamental grasses), and a restored 16-acre savannah woodland called Walnut
Woods. Planned for the future are a Visitor's and Education Center, additional
gardens, an amphitheater, a lake and a children's garden. "Yours to enjoy all
year long."
Waveland
State Historic Site: 225 Waveland Museum Road,
Lexington, KY 40514-1601
(859)272-3611.
- This impressive Greek Revival mansion, built in 1847 and now a
living history museum, displays antebellum herb and flower gardens on its 10
acres of lovely grounds.
Western Kentucky Botanical Garden: 25 Carter Road,
Owensboro, KY (270)852-8925.
- This wonderful botanical garden, begun in 1993,
offers 9 acres of gardens including Watkin's Allee, a Rose Garden (250 roses), the Mary Takahashi Japanese Memorial Garden, the Moonlight Children's Garden
(with a Butterfly garden, a Zoo garden, a Pizza garden, a gourd teepee, raised elevated vegetable gardens and a maze of China Girl Hollies),
a Daylily Garden (350 different cultivars), an Iris Garden (with fountain), the Historic Doctor's Building (showcasing the historic practice of
herb medicine), the Fruit and Berry Garden, the Gazebo, the Herb Garden (including medicinal, tea, culinary, fragrant, dye, a Peony walk and a Knot Garden plus
an armillary sundial and a border of yews, Canadian hemlocks, Foster hollies, Northern Bayberry and boxwood), a sculpture of a praying mantis,
the Joanne Field Weller Memorial Garden, the GG Talbott Memorial, the Pond and Native Plant area (complete with frogs, snakes, turtles, muskrats, many insects, and a
wildflower area), the Luettgen Ericaceous Garden (azaleas and Rhododendrons), the Ornamental Grass Garden, the University of Kentucky Experimental
Garden, the Red, White and Blue Garden, various Seasonal Gardens, and Historic Trees. Future gardens include a garden for the developmentally disabled,
an English Cottage Garden, a Native plant garden, a Shade garden and a Pinetum.
Whitehall House and
Gardens: 3110 Lexington Road,
Louisville, KY 40206 (502)897-2944.
- This 1855
Classic Revival antebellum mansion on just under 10 acres includes an extensive
Florentine garden including an Entrance Garden, the Ralph Archer Woodland
Garden, Annie's Garden and the Formal Garden.
Yew Dell Botanical Gardens:
6220 Old LaGrange Road,
Crestwood, KY 40014 (502)241-4788.
-
Yew Dell is a nationally-recognized center of gardening and sustainable horticulture that offers extensive display gardens
including an Arboretum (with collections of dogwood, beech and holly),
the Big Pine Garden, the Dry Stream Garden, the Greenhouse Terrace, the Overlook Gardens
(featuring perennials that thrive in hot dry weather),
the Secret Garden (with a holly allee, featuring ferns, camellias, lenten roses and hardy giners), the Serpentine Garden
(the evergreens are the historical core of the gardens), the Sunken Garden (with plants gathered from the Himilayas to the desert Southwest), the Nurseries (including unique
plants from around Kentucky and from all over the world), the Vegetable Gardens, and the Walled Garden (a traditional English garden
with walls of beautiful local limestone). The gardens also showcase elements of Kentucky's rural heritage and modern, cutting-edge architecture.