Kiftsgate Court Gardens sits on the same Gloucestershire escarpment as H
Kiftsgate Court Gardens sits on the same Gloucestershire escarpment as Hidcote, a few hundred yards away along the edge of the Cotswold scarp. Where Hidcote is a National Trust property with all that implies, Kiftsgate remains in private hands — maintained and developed by three successive generations of the same family since Heather Muir began planting in the 1920s. That continuity gives it a character quite different from its more celebrated neighbour.
The garden is famous above all for the Rosa filipes 'Kiftsgate', a climbing rose of extraordinary vigour that has scrambled through a group of trees to create one of the most spectacular plant specimens in England. Each June its thousands of small white flowers fill the air with scent. But Kiftsgate has much more to offer: a formal walled garden, deep herbaceous borders, and a remarkable swimming pool garden created by the current owner that shows what serious contemporary design looks like in a historic setting.
Visiting Kiftsgate alongside Hidcote in the same afternoon — as our Cotswolds tour allows — reveals two entirely different approaches to the same Arts and Crafts inheritance. The comparison is instructive and the combined experience is one of the great garden afternoons in England.