RHS Wisley (Surrey, England)
I'm up to the last day of my trip to England last May, and we ended with a trip to the second most visited garden in the country - RHS Wisley (Kew Gardens is the most visited). Most of the previous day was spent at the Chelsea Flower Show , which I will cover in the next post. I did not realize how huge this garden was until I started going through my photos. It is more than a garden - it is a horticultural institution. The garden was originally created by businessman, scientist, and inventor George Fergusson Wilson in 1878. He used a small portion of the estate to create the "Oakwood Experimental Garden" where he grew plants that were unusual in England at the time. Among his horticultural achievements was growing lilies outside the greenhouse and water gardening. Wilson's garden attracted notable visitors during his day, including fellow gardeners Ellen Willmott and Gertrude Jekyll (Jekyll actually worked some in the garden with him). Wilson died in 1902, and the pr...
