There would have been a Kitchen Garden at Doddington from the earliest days growing fresh produce for the household. However, in the 1960s half of it was allowed to become fallow.

When Claire was growing up, all her vegetables came from the remaining area still in cultivation and the pleasure of growing and picking vegetables, preserving them and eating with the seasons is something that was ingrained in her from a young age. It is this that inspired the project to restore the Kitchen Garden to its former glory. 

Thanks to a grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, the formerly neglected two-acre walled Kitchen Garden was restored and brought back into production in 2007. 

The abundance of seasonal produce is used in our Farm Shop, Cafés, Restaurant and events catering.

With the help of our gardeners and a brilliant team of volunteers, we implement the best of the traditional techniques such as crop rotation, biological controls and no-dig beds, to naturally maximise productivity and minimise pests so we have no need for chemical fertilisers, weed killers or pesticides.