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Amenity Horticulture Centre

Horticulture

Amenity Horticulture Centre

The walled garden, built in 1801, is a major horticultural attraction with its knot garden, maze and fruit garden. The Richardson’s Walled Garden was redeveloped for the millennium and was one of the largest private/public sector initiatives to happen in Northern Ireland. Greenmount horticulturalists designed the garden, provided the site, technical expertise and labour. Richardson’s Fertilisers supported the project financially.

The Richardson’s Walled Garden has a dramatic, formal framework with softer planting within. Features include a fountain and cascade, a bronze sculpture, intricate Celtic knot gardens and a small maze. These are a wonderful contrast to the colourful mixed borders and rose beds. Pleached lime trees, formal yew hedges and a large trellis clad pergola contrast the informal potager planting of fruit and vegetables amongst ornamentals.

Northern Ireland is world famous for rose breeding. The DAERA Rose Garden celebrates this status and formally marks over forty years of the Department of Agriculture working with the Rose Society of Northern Ireland. The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) awards a prize for the best Floribunda Rose (cluster flowered) in the annual International Rose Trials held in Belfast. The design of the garden is loosely based on a rose shape. This concept allows for modular extension as further varieties are added each year. Paths are laid in bright clay paviours that will retain their colour as time passes. A central decorative metal structure with matching arches and a series of metal obelisks has been added to add height and interest throughout the year but especially in winter.