Are Horsham Botanic Gardens a "Guilfoyle Garden"?

The first known design for the gardens was drawn up by W. R. Guilfoyle in 1880. The drawing still exists (see (A) below), but the coding system for the beds of trees and shrubs has been lost (each was to represent the flora of a different continent). However, it is only a plan and there is no certainty that either the paths or the planting plan were ever fully implemented. Very soon afterwards, the gardens clearly departed from Guilfoyle's plan: by 1884 a fernery had been built and in the 1890s an avenue of trees (Millar Avenue) was planted diagonally across Guilfoyle's main lawn, across his intended vista; the curator's house was also built within the gardens. The large lake on the western side of the gardens was almost certainly never constructed. Fashions in Edwardian times changed from the parkland gardens championed by Guilfoyle to those with numerous small features. A lakelet, fountain and rotunda were all added between 1900 and 1910.

Guilfoyle plan Guilfoyle plan 1980s plan Lord plan

The preference for small features was encapsulated still further in the plan proposed by Ernest Lord, the curator, in 1936 (see B above). His design focussed the gardens in the north-eastern corner and included an Italian sunken garden, a pond in the shape of Australia, swimming pool, running track, tourist camping area, tennis and croquet courts, and numerous small garden beds. Again, much of it was probably never implemented, though we do not know how much. Several of the features, such as the tennis courts, may well have simply have included developments that had already taken place. The palm lawn and the Australia pond have been features of the gardens ever since (click here for a series of photographs over the years). Although some of Guilfoyle's paths are still part of Lord's layout, it is unclear whether he obliterated major parts of Guilfoyle's design or whether they simply had not be completed.

A further design, dating from the late 1980s (see (C) above) introduced a rose garden and rotunda, further small feature garden beds (as well, no doubt, highlighting existing post-Lord chages) and squeezed the gardens even further into the north-east corner of the original garden area. The formal gardens now occupies less than a quarter of the original 16 hectare site.

In the figure below, the Lord plan has been superimposed on the current garden layout (produced for the 2004 Master Plan) and features from the three previous plans highlighted. The only evidence remaining of Guilfoyle's design is a few paths in the north-eastern corner and perhaps some of the trees in that area, shown in red. The remaining elements marked in blue appeared between the Guilfoyle and Lord plans (note that the tennis and croquet counts are now larger than on Lord's plan), while those definitely appearing on Lord's plan and perhaps created by him are shown in green. Much of Lord's plan is now under the area occupied by the caravan park. [Note that this is not a definitive study of the sequence of events and the ages of most trees have not been assessed].

The final plan (below) shows the areas of the original gardens now under car parks and works depot (red) and those used for sports and playground (blue). Clearly, much of the gardens that Guilfoyle designed no longer exist.

The process of sub-division of the north-eastern corner of the gardens into smaller features, which began not long after the original design, continues to this day. In 2007, the gardens received a major overhaul, with the division of much of the area into themed zones with the assistance of drought relief funding. Below is the map used by the gardens staff in management of these zones. It also attempts to identify paths and beds initiated under different curators.