NATIONAL Trust supporters are invited to celebrate the arrival of summer with a selection of top gardens to visit in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.

The gardens are at their peak during the summer months, with eye-popping colours, scented displays including sumptuous rose gardens, brilliant borders, brimming kitchen gardens, and relaxing open spaces with far-reaching views. Each place featured has picturesque picnic spots as well as cosy cafes offering summer treats.

Take some time out and enjoy scented rose gardens, striking summer borders and kitchen gardens bursting with ornamental fruit and vegetables. Each and every visit to a National Trust place helps support the charity’s work caring for special places for future generations.

Hinton Ampner

(Bramdean, near Alresford)

A horticultural jewel in the National Trust’s Hampshire crown, Hinton Ampner is bursting with floral scent and colour from June. In early summer swathes of elegant irises in cool blues, whites, reds and purples fill the south border, with more on show in the pretty walled kitchen garden. From August, you’ll find around 20 different varieties of exotic-looking dahlia, creating dramatic impact throughout the gardens, from rich tangerines and fiery reds, to deep pinks, yellows and creamy whites.

Roses are another summer highlight at Hinton, with more than 90 varieties on show. The collection is well known for its repeat flowering, giving delicious fragrance and colour from June well into August. Highlights include 100 highly scented ‘Whiter Shade of Pale’ tea rose shrubs in pale pink beside the pond. Rambling rose Alberic barbier sends creamy-white flowers arching over the shop doorway, whilst in early summer rambler Rosa banksiae ‘Lutea’ shoots graceful sprays of double yellow scented flowers right to the top of the house.

Hinton Ampner also has its own cut flower border, in summer filled with delphiniums, alstroemeria and richly scented sweet peas, so that staff can continue the tradition of providing floral displays for the house, for visitors to enjoy.

Discover the very best summer colour form 2.15pm-3.15pm every Tuesday on a free guided walk around the garden, which also delves into Hinton Ampner’s fascinating history.

For more details, visit nationaltrust.org.uk/hintonampner or call 01962 771305.

Mottisfont Abbey

(near Romsey)

For a truly memorable English summer garden experience, step into Mottisfont’s large walled garden in June and you’ll be met with unsurpassed fragrance and colour, from thousands of roses.

Mottisfont is home to one of the most famous rose gardens in the world, featuring the National Collection of old-fashioned roses. Seek out Malmaison – a sumptuous pale pink bourbon rose inspired by the Empress Josephine’s famous garden – and delicate Chinese tea roses in shades of cream, pink and red. The light crimson and deeply scented shrub Rosa gallica officinalis was brought to England from Persia by the Crusaders, and there are other hybrids so ancient that they are prehistoric.

“There are so many beautiful varieties,” said Mottisfont head gardener Jonny Bass. “But undoubtedly, one of my favourites is Adelaide d’Orleans – a white rambler that grows on frames over the paths; when in full bloom its beauty stops you in your tracks.”

The roses grow above big herbaceous borders which provide changing displays from June to September. The borders are packed with plants chosen for their structure, scent and wide colour palette. Agapanthus, geraniums and peonies mingle with pinks, lilies, phlox and nepeta. The centres of the borders are a mass of soft blues, pinks and whites, whilst stronger yellows, oranges and dark pinks draw your eye along the length of the border.

Many of the roses growing at Mottisfont are available for sale, so that everyone who visits Mottisfont has the chance to take away a little of its scented magic.

For those who can’t get along to Mottisfont during the working day, the property is staying open late on some evenings in June – visit www.nationaltrust.org.uk/mottisfont or call 01794 340757 nearer the time for further details. Mottisfont’s garden team also runs ‘Ask the Gardener’ sessions from 2pm-3pm daily throughout June. Get expert advice on caring for roses and everything else in your garden.

The Vyne

(near Basingstoke)

In summer, the perfumed herbaceous borders of this former Tudor ‘powerhouse’ are packed with eye-catching shape and colour. Look out for deep magenta and royal blue geraniums, elegant foxtail lilies and peonies in shades of cream, pink and burgundy. Don’t forget to take a peek inside the unusual 17th Century circular summerhouse, and the walled kitchen garden, which is full of fruit and vegetables.

While in the kitchen garden look out for the bee pen, which contains pots full of pollinator-friendly plants. This part of the garden is a hive of activity in summer, as honey bees forage for food. It’s a great place to seek inspiration for bee-loving plants you can grow in your own garden too.

From June, the summerhouse garden is filled with orange pelargonium, dark chocolate plectranthus and white salvias – shades that reflect and compliment the brickwork of the building in this formal garden.

From August, a nod to The Vyne’s past bursts into bloom. The garden’s magnificent dahlia border, which has a backdrop of cordon, espallier and palmette fruit trees features a gorgeous array of colours, from soft pastel shades to vibrant oranges, hot pinks and magenta blooms. Dahlias were an important part of horticultural life at The Vyne in the 19th-century, when head gardener Mr Broomfield regularly won prizes for his blooms at local shows.

For more details, visit nationaltrust.org.uk/thevyne or call 01256 883858.

Mottistone

(near Brighstone, Isle of Wight)

Set in a sheltered valley surrounding an attractive Elizabethan manor house, this 20th Century garden takes advantage of its southerly location and maritime climate with eye-catching Mediterranean-style planting.

Sub-tropical plants were introduced several years ago – look out for tulip and mulberry trees, and a little olive grove. To the front of the house visitors will discover exotic-looking red spider flowers and fragrant five foot ginger lilies, interspersed by the feathery leaves of African grasses.

The stars of the show at Mottistone are its double herbaceous borders, packed with and African daisies in pale pinks, purples and creams leading to vibrant reds, oranges and blues. Edging the borders are pretty hedges of blue catmint, mingled with the creamy yellow flowers of Sisyrinchium.

Walk up to the top of the hill and you can rest on the semi-circular stone bench above the organic kitchen garden. Flanked by grassy banks covered in wild flowers, the view looks down through an avenue of trees leading towards the pretty Rose Garden; an idyllic spot on a summer’s day.

For more details, visit nationaltrust.org.uk/mottistone or call 01983 741302.