Gallery: Everything's Coming Up Roses - Royal Gardens Galore

The Queen’s corgis use this garden more than anyone else does. Boasting an ornamental lake with flamingoes, the expanse behind Buckingham Palace is the site for the ultimate Garden Parties in summer. A recent addition is a vegetable garden, featuring tomatoes ‘Queen of Hearts’, ‘Golden Queen’ and ‘White Queen’; the beans are ‘Royal Red’ and ‘Blue Queen’; one of the lettuces is ‘Northern Queen

A masterpiece of organic practices and fine garden design. Starting in 1980, Prince Charles created a delightful series of garden rooms on his organic farm. Only the most dedicated of gardeners can boast a Stumpery in his grounds. If you get a ticket for a Highgrove garden tour, bear in mind that Prince Charles has admitted he likes to lie on the floor in the house, under an open window, to hear what garden visitors are saying.

The rhododendron trusses decorating Westminster Abbey for Prince William’s wedding are sure to come from this section of Windsor Great Park. A flowering forest, filled with maples and specimen trees, it sits on the northern shore of Virginia Water. Could this “flowering forest” be the prime inspiration for the arboreal decoration of the Abbey?

When not tramping the heathery hills, pony trekking, or having barbecues, the Royals enjoy the traditional flower beds and kitchen gardens near Balmoral Castle. The family is clad in kilts and tartan skirts up there. Is a sporran a handy place to carry a pair of secateurs? Balmoral’s 50,000 acres give the most-photographed people in the world a taste of privacy each August. And it gives the servants a chance to bring meaning to the expression “immoral Balmoral”.

The thirty-five acres of ornamental gardens in the grounds of Windsor Castle are known as the finest woodland garden in England. It includes a new Rose Garden where the head gardener recently refused to put the namesake roses 'Catherine' and 'Royal William' in the same bed, saying their colors clashed. Apparently not everyone is all soppy over the royal wedding.

Bought by Edward VII when he was Prince of Wales, this Norfolk estate has ornamental gardens near the house, and acres of arable land. When the Royals aren’t blasting birds out of the sky they can enjoy the ponds and vistas of the flat landscape. Sandringham’s biggest claim to horticultural fame is the Flower Show there each summer. Charles and Camilla attend, looking (appropriately) Edwardian.