3 min readBristol’s Botanic Garden sits at The Holmes in Stoke Bishop, a peaceful oasis in our city. The Garden is a museum, and the plants are the exhibits set in displays that tell the remarkable stories of plants; from their beginnings millions of years ago, how they attract pollinators, and habitats such as rainforests, deserts, and our own Avon Gorge. But did you know that this is the fourth site of the University’s Botanic Garden in Bristol?
University Road and Tyndall Avenue
In 1882, Bristol University College awarded the Lecturer of Botany Adolf Leipner a full £15 to build a garden; he then fundraised another £89 and set about building Bristol’s first Botanic Garden. The site was on waste ground at the top of University Road, before moving to Tyndall Avenue, where it stayed for over 60 years, and was known as Hiatt Baker Garden. The site was used for teaching the Botany Degree students.
Image - Photograph likely by E.C. Stevens. Image courtesy of University of Bristol Library, Special Collections (DM2772)
Bracken Hill
When Senate House was built in 1959, the Garden moved again to Bracken Hill in Leigh Woods, where it stayed for a further 46 years. The Garden was notable for its synthetic stone called Pulhamite, created to look like the local limestone. The Garden continued to be used for teaching students, and in 1975, The Friends of The University of Bristol Botanic Garden were founded to support the work and development of the Garden.
Image - School Group in the 1970s at Bracken Hill
The Holmes
In 2005, the Garden moved to its fourth destination, The Holmes, a large Victorian house with a rich recent history of its own; during the planning of the Normandy Landings in 1944, US Army generals used it as a base for meetings.
The Garden at Bracken Hill was relocated and the Holmes was designed in a different way from traditional Botanic Gardens; it was not just to be for teaching and education, but a place for people from all over Bristol to be able to immerse themselves in the world of nature.
Today, twenty years later, it is all these things with meandering paths leading visitors through displays that appeal to both Botanists and people who didn’t think they liked plants but find out they do after a stroll around the Garden.
Image - The Holmes at Bristol Botanic Garden
The garden today
The Garden at the Holmes is now established and feels like it’s been there for a hundred years.
It’s open for seven days a week, children and students are free, and during 2026 on weekdays visitors can look around the Garden with no fixed entrance price; DAISY (Donate As It Suits You) Days will continue from Monday to Friday until the end of October 2026, so visitors can enjoy the changing seasons and magnificence of the plant world throughout the year.
Image - Giant Amazon water lily at Bristol Botanic Garden
Find out more on the University of Bristol Botanic Garden website, follow them on Instagram, or Facebook.
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