Visiting the garden at Wordsworth House

A space for people and nature

Walking off the busy streets of Cockermouth and into the green and blossoming garden inspires an instant feeling of ease. The surrounding walls covered in espaliered trees and rose bushes act as a perfect sound barrier and the free and easy way the garden grows with it's gentle structure and design invites you to step right in and make yourself at home. You will also often find our friendly volunteers who are more than happy to answer your question and share their knowledge. To make sure birds and pollinating insects also feel welcome, our head gardener Amanda uses organic principles throughout the garden and has specially selected local wildflowers and herbs to entice bees and butterflies to feast. The winter months are no time to be tidy as leftover apples, piles of dead leaves and leftover stems and sticks provide shelter and food for wildlife. It is only with the first signs of spring that the tidying begins so that the garden is ready for our first visitors. With blooms and blossoms from the first snowdrops and crocuses in late winter all the way to bright swaying sneezeweed in autumn, there is always something for both people and nature to enjoy.

The garden that inspired a poet

Wordsworth House’s walled riverside garden was William’s secret childhood playground. It was here that he learned the love of nature that turned him into one of the world’s favourite poets.

Today, it is filled with the colours, scents and sounds of summer. Wandering ‘lonely as a cloud’ among centuries-old varieties of flowers and fruit trees it isn’t hard to picture the wild child born here 250 years ago and how his ‘sweet birthplace’ inspired a lifetime of creativity.

Beneath the foliage-shrouded terrace where he and his beloved sister Dorothy used to play, the Derwent, his ‘fairest of all rivers’, gurgles by.

Summer in the garden

Summer is the time for roses at Wordsworth House. There is a range of beautiful old-fashioned shrub roses growing in the garden, and they are a real highlight in June and July, not just visually but also because of the fragrant scents that waft from them. Grown using organic principles, the garden provides a haven for our pollinators and is full of bees, who are loving the wildflower beds with their poppies and marigolds and can be found happily plunging into the foxgloves. Colour and scent are both appreciated in any garden, but the gentle hum of bumblebees as they go about their daily task of foraging pollen and nectar is, if you take the time to stop and listen, an absolute pleasure.

There are plenty of whimsical photograph opportunities in the garden during the summer. This is a fantastic time for an intimate wedding, with romantic hidden spots full of varying bursts of colour. It has a secret garden feeling, also wonderful for photographing children at play with our wooden Georgian garden games or at rest under the apple trees.

The Keswick codlin, one of our local heritage apple trees, is coming into fruit while the Morello cherries and figs are ripening on the espaliers. The Georgian herb and vegetable garden is slowly filling out as the summer months go by, giving a hint of what might have found its way to Wordsworth’s table.