Hamilton Gardens

Hamilton Gardens is not a botanical garden and says so: it does not set out to collect plants but to show garden-making as a cultural practice, with a series of enclosed gardens each built to a particular civilisation's conventions - an Italian Renaissance garden, a Chinese scholar's garden, a Japanese garden of contemplation, an English Arts and Crafts garden, an Indian Char Bagh, a Maori productive garden with its own planting logic, and a modernist and a surrealist garden among the contemporary ones. Each is walled so you enter it as a separate world. The site was a rubbish dump and a sand quarry before the 1960s, which the gardens do not hide. It won the International Garden of the Year award in 2014. Charging was introduced for non-Hamilton visitors for the enclosed section, which caused a local argument; the wider riverside grounds remain free.

What you actually see

• The enclosed gardens - each built to one civilisation's conventions.
• The Maori productive garden - planting logic rather than ornament.
• The contemporary gardens - modernist, surrealist and others.
• The site history - a former rubbish dump and quarry.

When to go

October to April for the planting at its best. Allow longer than expected - there are many enclosures and each takes time. Some are being added or renovated.

Honest expectations

Non-residents are charged for the enclosed gardens; the outer grounds are free. It is a themed cultural display rather than a plant collection, which disappoints some horticultural visitors. Enclosures can be closed for work.

Nearby

Hamilton city and the Waikato River path are alongside; Cambridge is south-east.