Exotic gardens that will banish the winter blues

The arrival of winter is a double-edged sword for the garden lover. On the one hand we accept it as an inevitable part of the cycle of seasons.

But there is always a part of me that slips into mournful mode once green is subsumed by brownish grey in the garden.

Fortunately there are plenty of wonderful horticultural experiences to be had in warmer climes to help banish any winter gardening blues.

Southern California is a favourite destination of mine in late autumn and winter, with daytime temperatures in the south of the state around 20°C and some highly memorable landscapes. The drive down the Pacific Coast Highway is never to be forgotten. Starting north of San Francisco in the wine regions of Napa and Sonoma, the route takes in the seaside towns of Santa Cruz, Monterey and Carmel and the soaring redwoods and near-empty beaches of Big Sur.

Santa Barbara is a must-visit town if you’re into plants, and is graced with a range of fascinating trees, including a record-breaking Moreton Bay fig tree (Ficus macrophylla), which was designated a California historic landmark in 1970.

On the edge of town is one of the most eclectic gardens ever made. Lotusland is the creation of Ganna Walska, a Polish-born opera singer who arrived in Santa Barbara in the early Forties, and soon after bought the 37-acre plot with the intention of encouraging Tibetan monks to visit and stay.

Perhaps unsurprisingly this endeavour was unsuccessful, after which Walska changed the name of the property from Tibetland to Lotusland and got on with making a truly exceptional garden. The singer created a garden of rooms, a concept that many will be familiar with from places such as Sissinghurst and Hidcote. Where Lotusland is wildly different, however, is in the contents of these spaces. There is a room of succulents, another of cycads, exuberant topiary and the blue garden, featuring vast blue-grey Agave.

Walska enjoyed massing single species of plants, and so there is an aloe garden with more than 170 types. She died in 1984 but the garden has continued to develop, with the inclusion of a madcap cactus area. I visited on a sunny day in October, and with the doors of the house thrown open and Walska’s soprano piped from a gramophone it was easy to imagine she might waft through her “theatre garden”.

While Lotusland is a confection of exotic species, Santa Barbara Botanic Garden focuses on the preservation of native plants. Few botanic gardens have a more spectacular setting, with views down canyons and into the mountains beyond.

Green-fingered poet Edward James might have been a neighbour of Walska, had he not decided that Los Angeles wasn’t quite the right place to embark on a new horticultural venture. Instead James ended up in Xilitla, Mexico, where he created a fantastical landscape garden, Las Pozas, in the mountainous subtropical rainforest. He filled the jungle with towering surrealist sculptures that have evocative names such as “The House with a Roof like a Whale”.

Tasmania is a long way from California, but the 22-acre gardens at Inverawe share commonalities with Santa Barbara Botanic Garden. The owners embarked on a programme of replanting with Australian natives. Some of the quirkier touches – such as the gnome-like characters – are an acquired taste, but the plant collections and views are worth the journey alone. A trip to Inverawe can be easily doubled up with one to the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens, which has, uniquely, a sub-Antarctic plant house.

If you only have a long weekend to spare, Marrakesh is the place. It’s warm enough to take the chill out of the bones even in December with highs of up to 19C. Jardin Majorelle is the most famous garden in Morocco, the iconic blue forever associated with Yves Saint-Laurent, who with his partner Pierre Bergé restored the original garden made by Jacques Majorelle. But it isn’t the bustling city’s only attraction.

The Agdal Gardens are really a huge orchard rather than a traditional garden, originally laid out for the royal family more than 800 years ago. There are superb privately owned gardens too, such as one at Jnane Tamsna and the cloister-like courtyard at Riad Enija, located in the old Medina.