Sponsored by Bradt Guides, the Slow Travel Awards celebrate sustainability and authenticity. The slow travel movement follows in the steps of the slow food movement; local, organic, a reaction against clone towns and mass marketing.
The Best Garden/Arboretum award recognises the beauty, tranquillity and design of Iford Manor’s gardens, largely created by British (landscape) architect and garden designer, Harold Peto – who lived there from 1899 to 1933.
Located in Wiltshire, Iford Manor is a manor house (Grade II* listed) sits on the steep, south-facing slope of the Frome valley, in Westwood parish, about 2 miles southwest of Bradford-on-Avon. The gardens are grade I listed and are open to the public from April to September each year. The estate, now home to the Cartwright-Hignett family since 1965, has a 2.5-acre garden set on a south-facing hillside, has been lovingly restored and developed over the decades, under the guidance of Head Gardener, Steve Lannin and his gardening team.
The structural design is largely original to that created by Harold Peto, who had with a talent for placing objects sympathetically to their surroundings. Influenced mainly by his love of Roman, Italian and Japanese design, Peto was a promoter of the renaissance period and had a strong influence on the Arts and Crafts period – very much evident in this incredibly beautiful garden.
The estate boasts an award-winning restaurant, the Iford Manor Kitchen – known for its ‘honest food’ sourced from estate and local sustainable produce, managed by Head Chef Matt Briddon.