Cradley Open Gardens 2025
28 June 2025 to 29 June 2025
The gardens in Cradley will be open from Midday to 5pm on Saturday 28th and Sunday 29th June.
Entry is by programme which costs £10 and will be available at whichever garden you choose to start from. Proceeds will go to the church.
What better activity is there than a stroll around Cradley on a summer’s day, visiting 12 beautiful and inspirational gardens? Cradley Open Gardens is a popular biannual event, providing an opportunity to marvel at the gardening expertise of local people, while exploring different corners of the village. If you don’t know Cradley, its tucked among gentle hills and has a fine 16th-century village hall, an ancient yew tree, a Grade II* listed church, and woodland that runs alongside its brook. The village is in two parts: enough to occupy a visit on both days!
This year’s gardens, which are spread through both parts of the village, are a mixture of large spaces and smaller patches with many inventive and surprising elements. The garden at Broadmead has a spring-fed brook, woodland path and animals peering from the undergrowth, providing an ideal place for children to explore. The owners, who have gardened there for over 27 years, say they love seeing the reaction of people entering who don’t expect to find a garden of its size attached to a modern house.
The Hurst, a smallholding which opens for the National Garden Scheme, has a turf spiral at the centre, a moon gate and borders planted to correspond with the five elements. Elsewhere, you will find well-tended vegetable plots brimming with produce, wildflower meadows, colourful borders and orchards. Along the way, in different gardens, there will be stalls selling plants, second-hand books and refreshing glasses of Pimm’s. There will also be tea, coffee and cream teas available at Queenswood Bed and Breakfast, and there will be a map to guide you from garden to garden.
An additional element to the Open Gardens this year is the chance to spot some of the 110 Planters for Pollinators placed in front gardens around the village. These were planted in response to a campaign run by Cradley Women’s Institute and local wildlife group, Cradley Wild, to celebrate the 110th anniversary of the national Women’s Institute. The aim of the campaign is to raise awareness of the huge decline in numbers of pollinating insects. The aim of the planters is to help remedy this by filling the village with flowers that attract them. Villagers were quick to respond to the call to fill a planter and the ambitious target of 110 planters was quickly reached. Each pot is numbered so they are easy to find as you stroll through the village.