8 of the Most Beautiful Hotel Gardens in America
There's something special about hotels that manage to be as beautiful and inviting on the outside as they are on the inside. It's a challenging trick to pull off, but through a mix of colors and textures, formal and casual aesthetics, and a touch of technical innovation, all of the gardens in The Art of The Garden by Relais & Chateaux North America fit the bill and then some. Whether you're craving some travel inspiration or planning out your own fantasy garden, these dreamy green wonderlands are some of the most beautiful examples of hotel gardens in the US.
The Inn at Little Washington, Washington, Virginia
The gardens of the Inn at Little Washington espouse a style that chef and creator Patrick O'Connell refers to as "Virginia ecclectic," blending the geometry of the Chateaux Vaux-le-Vicompte with neatly trimmed shrubbery and tended paths and the bucolic gardens of George Washington's Mount Vernon with more organic spills of herbs and flowers.
The Little Nell, Aspen, Colorado
The surface of this Aspen inn's garden wall serves as a living canvas, filled with native blooms like petunias and calibrachoas and anchored at the base by climbing English ivy. Irrigation lines are interwoven throughout to ensure the towering blossoms never go thirsty.
The Charlotte Inn, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts
Dark green arbors and accents serve as a background for the lush greenery and bright begonias that thrive among the serpentine cobbled paths and thoughtfully placed antiques in this English country-inspired garden.
Glenmere Mansion, Chester, New York
On the border between crisp, classical formalism and breezy, wild-grown majesty sits this beautiful vista in upstate New York. "The combination looks modern an new without looking too formal," says the inn's owner, Alan Stenberg. To replicate the look on a smaller scale, he suggests crafting a parterre of perennials and herbs around existing flower beds.
Rancho Valencia, Rancho Santa Fe, California
In true Californian style, the gardens of this forty-five acre Spanish Colonial oasis mix the serene with the spectacular, offering vast open spaces filled calming reflecting pools and riotous plantings of hibiscus, Mexican sage, and bougainvilleas.
Old Edwards Inn & Spa, Highlands, North Carolina
Flowers aren't the only way of making a gorgeous hotel garden. This North Carolina inn has blended form with function, planting the over three hundred varieties of of fruits, vegetables, and herbs in its kitchen garden according to color to offer inspiration to the kitchen's chefs.
Auberge Du Soleil, Rutherford, California
This Napa Valley garden reimagines the Mediterranean garden as an arid, modern art-studded paradise for an effect that feels quintessentially Californian. Crisply contoured topiaries contrast with the twisting branches of olive trees, all anchored by native stone that creates a connection to the hotel's natural landscape.
The Fearrington House Inn, Restaurant & Spa, Pittsboro, North Carolina
The easygoing Southern charm of this garden design was the brainchild of the inn's founder Jenny Fitch. Today her son Greg Fitch oversees the plantings in the quiet spot known as Jenny's Garden, filling it with native flowers like honeysuckle, smilaxes, kiwis, and annual vines that climb the trellises to keep the verdant retreat blooming year round.
These grounds are so pretty you'll want to book a stay for the greenery alone.