ROOMS with a VIEW

York Gate Garden started out as farmland but through the tenacity of one family it became the beautiful collection of garden rooms we see today, which were all carved out using yew and beech hedges

- ANNETTE WARREN

AS WE expand the collection, the snowdrops are planted according to colour and group,' says Jack Ogg, head gardener at York Gate Garden in the West Yorkshire village of Adel, on the outskirts of Leeds. Snowdrops play a big role in attracting visitors to this historically important Grade II-listed garden, and its February snowdrop days are a great opportunity to see them.

Established in the mid 1950s by Sybil and Frederick Spencer, York Gate was laid out in the arts and crafts style. The bones of the garden are most visible in winter, with topiary, conifers and drystone walls defining each area within the one-acre garden.

York Gate was originally a small working farm, but along with their son Robin, the Spencers gradually shaped it into the garden we see today. Paths, ponds, stone sculptures and dells all feature, with a good deal of seating. 'Some of the seats are strategically placed to enjoy the vistas but others just because they happened to fit in!' wrote Sybil in her memoirs.