New Zealand’s Hamilton Gardens

Tudor Garden, Hamilton Gardens. Lonnie C. photo

By Lonnie C.

Located along the Waikato River, the land of what is today Hamilton Gardens was originally home to the Māori people, who raised crops of kumara, yams and taro.

With European settlement, the area was repurposed as a rifle range, a dog dosing strip (where sheep dogs were treated for tapeworms they can contract from the sheep), a sand quarry, a go-cart track, and, by the 1960s, the city rubbish dump. It was nearly impossible to imagine that this neglected area would one day become an award-winning public garden with more that 1.1 million visitors each year.

Today Hamilton Gardens is a 54-hectare park encompassing enclosed gardens, open lawns, a lake, a nursery, a convention center and the Hamilton East Cemetery.

Not technically classified as a botanical garden, the Hamilton Gardens features 28 unique gardens representing art, beliefs, lifestyles and traditions of different civilizations or historical gardening styles.

Since I cannot begin to describe all the wonderful gardens in any detail, I will let a sampling of pictures speak volumes and also direct you to hamiltongardens.co.nz.