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Orchid Weeks
Four thousand orchids in flower across the Temperate House.
10 am to 4.30 pm dailySee Orchid Weeks
Four climates under glass, forty acres outside
Fennick has grown plants under glass in the middle of Cheltenham since 1868. Today the garden holds twelve thousand living plants, sixty thousand herbarium specimens and one of the finest Victorian glasshouse ranges in England.
Walk four climates in an hour
From 27°C lowland rainforest to desert air at 18% humidity, all under one roofline.
Something new each season
Four exhibitions a year, Snowdrop Sundays, summer lates and the autumn plant fair.
Learn from the growers
Courses, school visits and Saturday tours with the gardeners and the herbarium team.
Easy for everyone
Step-free through every glasshouse. Under-4s and carers come in free, and the café needs no ticket.
Four rooms, four climates
Walk through the glasshousesPalm House
Cast in Fennick’s own foundry in 1868 and nineteen metres to the lantern. Cocoa, vanilla and coffee grow under the dome.
Fern House
A sunken house kept in permanent shade, with tree ferns from New Zealand and Tasmania above a floor of filmy ferns.
Cloud Forest
Cool, wet and misted every twenty minutes. Orchids, bromeliads and begonias from two thousand metres up.
Arid House
Dry air, full sun and gravel beds. Agaves, aloes and a golden barrel cactus older than the house itself.
Palm House
27°C · 85%Cast in Fennick’s own foundry in 1868 and nineteen metres to the lantern. Cocoa, vanilla and coffee grow under the dome.
Fern House
19°C · 92%A sunken house kept in permanent shade, with tree ferns from New Zealand and Tasmania above a floor of filmy ferns.
Cloud Forest
16°C · 95%Cool, wet and misted every twenty minutes. Orchids, bromeliads and begonias from two thousand metres up.
Arid House
24°C · 18%Dry air, full sun and gravel beds. Agaves, aloes and a golden barrel cactus older than the house itself.
Four thousand orchids, one glasshouse
For seven weeks the Temperate House fills with orchids from our own collection and three specialist nurseries: moth orchids in cascades, slipper orchids at eye level and a wall of Dendrobium over the pond.
- Every day
- 10 am to 4.30 pm
- Thursday lates
- Until 8 pm, from February
- Orchid care clinic
- Saturdays at 11 am, with the nursery team
- Members’ preview
- The day before it opens
What’s on through the year
The same calendar every year, so you can plan around the plants.
- Jan to MarSeven weeksOrchid WeeksTemperate House
FebruarySundaysSnowdrop SundaysBeech woodland, 11 am and 2 pm
Half termsDailySeed detectivesFern House and woodland
Jul and AugThursdaysSummer latesThe double border, until 8 pm
All yearMonthlyCourses and talksLearning Studio and the Orangery
DecemberWeekendsWinter wreathsThe potting shed
Forty acres outside
The glasshouses are only half of it. The garden outside changes every few weeks, so here is what to look for in each season.
Snowdrops under the beeches, witch hazel on the Long Walk and the warmest rooms in Gloucestershire.
In flower
- SnowdropGalanthus ‘S. Arnott’
- Witch hazelHamamelis × intermedia ‘Jelena’
- Christmas boxSarcococca confusa
- Lenten roseHelleborus × hybridus
Magnolias along the Lansdown lawn, then tulips in the formal beds and the first irises at the pond.
In flower
- MagnoliaMagnolia campbellii
- TulipTulipa ‘Ballerina’
- WisteriaWisteria sinensis
- Siberian irisIris sibirica
The double border at full height, roses on the pergola and the lily pond in flower until September.
In flower
- SageSalvia ‘Caradonna’
- Rambling roseRosa ‘Albertine’
- Water lilyNymphaea ‘Gonnère’
- African lilyAgapanthus ‘Navy Blue’
Maples turning in the Japanese valley, asters on the border and cyclamen across the woodland floor.
In flower
- Japanese mapleAcer palmatum ‘Osakazuki’
- AsterSymphyotrichum ‘Little Carlow’
- Ivy-leaved cyclamenCyclamen hederifolium
- Autumn crocusColchicum speciosum
Plan your visit
Open every day from 10 am, except 25 and 26 December. Pay at the gate; members and under-4s come in free.
- Adult
- £19.50
- Concession 60+, students, jobseekers
- £17.00
- Child 4 to 16
- £6.00
- Family 2 adults, up to 3 children
- £45.00
- Under 4, carers and members
- Free
- Garden, November to February
- 10 am to 5 pm
- Garden, March to October
- 10 am to 6 pm
- Glasshouses
- Close 30 minutes before the garden
- Last entry
- 45 minutes before closing
- The Orangery café
- 10 am to 4.30 pm
- By train
- Cheltenham Spa, then a twelve-minute walk up Lansdown Road
- By bus
- Routes D and E stop at Fennick Gate
- By car
- 64 spaces on Lansdown Walk, £1.80 an hour, 8 accessible bays
- By bike
- Covered racks at both gates
- Step-free
- One level route through all four glasshouses
- To borrow
- Wheelchairs and two mobility scooters, ask ahead
- Quiet hour
- Tuesdays, 10 am to 11 am, mist and music off
- Assistance dogs
- Welcome everywhere, water at both gates
Free entry, all year
Members come in free on every day we are open, see every exhibition first and help pay for the 31 gardeners who keep the collection alive.
£110 a year Two adults at the same address
- Free entry, every day we are open
- Members’ mornings from 9 am, before the gates open
- A members’ preview of every exhibition
- 10% off in the Orangery café
“We come most Sunday mornings, before the doors open to everyone else. The Fern House at nine, with nobody in it, is the quietest place in Cheltenham.”
Learn from the gardeners
Courses, school visits and a working herbarium, all taught by the people who grow the collection.
Drawing, propagation, pruning and plant science, taught by the people who grow the collection.
- Day courses from £65
- Evening talks on the first Thursday of the month
- Five-week botanical drawing certificate
Curriculum-linked sessions for Key Stages 1 to 4, taught inside the glasshouses.
- £4.50 a pupil, accompanying adults free
- Rainforest, adaptation and pollination workshops
- A free planning visit for teachers
Sixty thousand pressed specimens, a seed bank of 1,800 species and a reading room open by appointment.
- Reading room on Tuesdays and Thursdays
- Specimen loans to universities
- Volunteer mounting sessions
The Orangery café
Breakfast under the orangery glass, lunch from the kitchen garden and a proper cream tea. No ticket needed.
From the potting shed
All stories
The potting shed in NovemberCuttings, cold frames and the first sowings for Orchid Weeks.
Repotting a 150-year-old cycadSix gardeners, a gantry and two days: how we moved Encephalartos altensteinii into its fourth pot since 1874.
Why the Cloud Forest is kept at 16°CCool nights make Andean orchids flower. The mist runs every twenty minutes and the vents open at 18°C.
Come in from the cold
Inside the Palm House it is 27°C all winter. Open every day from 10 am, and the café needs no ticket.