The Best Places for Garden Lovers

As an excellent way to pass time and get closer to nature, gardening is a popular hobby. We wanted to discover more about people’s gardening habits - more specifically where is the best place to live if you cherish outdoor space and all things gardening-related.

Percentage of addresses with private outdoor space

Outdoor space is often a highly sought-after amenity when deciding where to live - and Peterborough, Gloucester and Hull are found to be the locations that have the highest offering, with over 90% of addresses having private outdoor space. You are slightly less likely to strike gold with private outdoor space in cities like London, Manchester, and Dundee however, as less than 80% of addresses offer this luxury.

Average size of private outdoor space

For a significant measure of outdoor space, Scotland is the place to be with Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Dundee all being in the top five cities. The number one spot is awarded to Chelmsford where on average 88% of homes have private outdoor space. However, it seems cities nearer the coast such as Liverpool and Portsmouth offer less garden space, at just 150m² or less on average which is significantly lower than the average UK size of 213m².

Number of gardening groups per capita

Southern cities are the place to be if you’re looking for an area that is rife with gardening groups, with Chelmsford hosting on average 126 groups per capita, closely followed by Exeter and Brighton. On the other end of the scale, the locations with a small number of gardening groups are more widely spread out, with Hull, Birmingham and London offering less than two groups per capita each.

Number of gardening centres per capita

Gardening centres are in large quantities across Chelmsford, Brighton, and Oxford, where there are on average between 20 and 40 per capita across these cities. You are, however, less likely to stumble across a garden centre in Aberdeen, London, and Glasgow where there is on average just one or less per capita for each city.

Average monthly searches for ‘gardening’ per capita

Online searching is the most common form of information sourcing, so let’s see which city has the most green-fingered gardening fans conducting online searches. The city of Lincoln has over 500 monthly searches for ‘gardening’, closely followed by Cambridge and Norwich with 454 and 413 searches respectively. Nottingham, Cardiff and Newport, however, have less than 100 searches per month each, with Newport showing the least interest by searching the term a mere 13 times on average.

Where’s the best place to live as a garden lover?

So, where should you up sticks to as a gardening fan? The city that tops the ranks as the best place for garden lovers is Chelmsford, with 88% of homes that have private outdoor space - which is on average 419.5 m² in size. If you feel inspired to put your green thumb to practise, make sure to check out our full outdoor furniture range, and why not add the finishing touches with garden accessories and outdoor lighting to create the perfect paradise in your garden.

Average garden sizes and percentages of addresses of outdoor space were taken from ONS’ 2020 release ‘Access to garden and public green space in Great Britain’. Desk research was then conducted to find the number of garden centres and gardening groups in each of our cities. Search volume data taken from Google's Keyword Planner in January 2022.

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