RoutesHiking trails & RoutesUnited KingdomEnglandWest Midlands RegionWorcestershireMalvern HillsCroome D'Abitot
Croome Walled Gardens – Croome Court loop from Croome D'Abitot
RoutesHiking trails & RoutesUnited KingdomEnglandWest Midlands RegionWorcestershireMalvern HillsCroome D'Abitot
Croome Walled Gardens – Croome Court loop from Croome D'Abitot
Easy
4.6
(14)
297
hikers
Croome Walled Gardens – Croome Court loop from Croome D'Abitot
01:25
5.43km
30m
Hiking
Easy hike. Great for any fitness level. Easily-accessible paths. Suitable for all skill levels. The starting point of the route is right next to a parking lot.
Last updated: June 19, 2026
Tips
Temporary access restrictions
Includes segments with temporary access restrictions.
After 215 m for 3.24 km
Customers only
After 4.33 km for 898 m
Customers only
Waypoints
A
Start point
Parking
Get Directions
1
1.14 km
Croome Lake
Highlight • Lake
All you by hand (spade)
Translated by Google •
Tip by
2
1.28 km
Croome Grotto
Highlight • Cave
Croome Grotto is a fascinating and historically significant feature located within the grounds of Croome Court. It was designed in the 18th century and is part of the extensive landscapes gardens created by renowned architect Capability Brown, for the 6th Earl of Coventry.
Tip by
3
1.32 km
Worcester Gates
Highlight • Monument
4
2.71 km
St Mary Magdalene's Church, Croome
Highlight • Religious Site
The original church at Croome was demolished by the 6th Earl of Coventry in the 1750s, along with the Jacobean house that stood in place of the current mansion. The new house and park, including the new church, was created by Capability Brown. The church itself is set on a hill, with great views out to the Malvern Hills.
Tip by
5
3.01 km
The Well
Highlight • Structure
From our research, this dry stone well was originally dug sometime between 1800 and 1810. It was a clear indication that the Dipping Pond was insufficient for the needs of the garden by then, either due to limited capacity or simply because it was too far to carry water up to the top.
When we first arrived, the only indication that it even existed was marked by a broken-down fence and some barbed wire. Who knows what might have fallen in there during the 50 years of abandonment. To render it safe, we constructed a red brick head with a steel grid, rather than opting to fill it in and, perhaps, later regretting it.
It was Autumn of 2022 when we revisited the prospect of further investigation, this time through necessity. For the second consecutive year, the Gardens had suffered from drought, with our water storage tanks running dry. We needed to act to avoid future recurrences and the prospect of adding more unsightly tanks was unappealing and expensive. The Well seemed an obvious choice to explore, despite the risk of what we might find down there. Unfortunately, it needed to be dredged to bring the level down to below the water table.
After a lengthy discussion with our site manager, it was mutually agreed that neither of us were prepared to climb down the well. So, after a Google search, we found a specialist well dredging firm, who agreed to take on the task. The husband-and-wife team arrived in November, set up their tripod with block & tackle and began their work. He operated the pulleys while she was lowered into the hole with a bucket and trowel.
After several days of excavating dark and smelly sludge, they hit some inanimate objects which were too heavy for their lifting equipment. A week or so later, they returned with a heavy-duty overhead crane, which proved sufficient to retrieve the cast iron pump which, at some point, had been cut into shorter pieces and thrown back down the well. With the offending objects now removed, they were able to complete their task and restore the well to its former glory.
Happily, we now have an abundant supply of water to keep the irrigation system topped up all year round
When we first arrived, the only indication that it even existed was marked by a broken-down fence and some barbed wire. Who knows what might have fallen in there during the 50 years of abandonment. To render it safe, we constructed a red brick head with a steel grid, rather than opting to fill it in and, perhaps, later regretting it.
It was Autumn of 2022 when we revisited the prospect of further investigation, this time through necessity. For the second consecutive year, the Gardens had suffered from drought, with our water storage tanks running dry. We needed to act to avoid future recurrences and the prospect of adding more unsightly tanks was unappealing and expensive. The Well seemed an obvious choice to explore, despite the risk of what we might find down there. Unfortunately, it needed to be dredged to bring the level down to below the water table.
After a lengthy discussion with our site manager, it was mutually agreed that neither of us were prepared to climb down the well. So, after a Google search, we found a specialist well dredging firm, who agreed to take on the task. The husband-and-wife team arrived in November, set up their tripod with block & tackle and began their work. He operated the pulleys while she was lowered into the hole with a bucket and trowel.
After several days of excavating dark and smelly sludge, they hit some inanimate objects which were too heavy for their lifting equipment. A week or so later, they returned with a heavy-duty overhead crane, which proved sufficient to retrieve the cast iron pump which, at some point, had been cut into shorter pieces and thrown back down the well. With the offending objects now removed, they were able to complete their task and restore the well to its former glory.
Happily, we now have an abundant supply of water to keep the irrigation system topped up all year round
Tip by
6
3.01 km
Croome Walled Gardens
Highlight • Historical Site
The Croome Walled Gardens are privately owned, historic, and restored Georgian gardens, separate from the National Trust's Croome parkland. Originally dating to the 16th century, they were brought back to life by Chris and Karen Cronin starting in 2000. The gardens feature large greenhouses, a rose garden, and vegetable plots, and they are open to the public from April to September on weekends and bank holidays.
History and restoration
The gardens were once part of the landscape designed by "Capability" Brown and fell into ruin before the restoration project began.
The privately owned gardens have been restored by custodians Chris and Karen Cronin since 2000.
The gardens are notable for their size and the 18th-century records that have survived, making them of national importance.
They were once used to supply food for Croome Court and include historical features like a 13-foot high "hot wall" from the early 19th century.
History and restoration
The gardens were once part of the landscape designed by "Capability" Brown and fell into ruin before the restoration project began.
The privately owned gardens have been restored by custodians Chris and Karen Cronin since 2000.
The gardens are notable for their size and the 18th-century records that have survived, making them of national importance.
They were once used to supply food for Croome Court and include historical features like a 13-foot high "hot wall" from the early 19th century.
Tip by
7
3.60 km
Historic Playground Merry-Go-Round
Highlight • Historical Site
There used to be a school at Croome and this is all that is left
Tip by
8
3.76 km
Croome Court
Highlight • Historical Site
Croome Court is a mid-18th-century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Upton-upon-Severn in south Worcestershire, England. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for the 6th Earl of Coventry, and they were Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the mansion's rooms were designed by Robert Adam. St Mary Magdalene's Church, Croome D'Abitot that sits within the grounds of the park is now owned and cared for by the Churches Conservation Trust.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust and leased to the National Trust, which operates it as a tourist attraction. The National Trust owns the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s. Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.
George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate in 1751, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate. It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work", and it is an important and seminal work. It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire). Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards. The house was visited by George III, as well as by Queen Victoria during summers when she was a child, and George V (when Duke of York).
A jam factory was built near Pershore railway station by the 9th Earl of Coventry in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam-making had ceased, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust during the First World War to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station. The First World War deeply affected Croome; there were many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the county, who needed a residence for his many official engagements. Croome Court was requisitioned during the Second World War by the Ministry of Works, and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed for two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.
The Croome Estate Trust sold the Court in 1948, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns from 1950 until 1979. In 1979, the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON, the Hare Krishna movement) which used it as its UK headquarters and a training college, called Chaitanya College. During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room. ISKCON left the estate in 1984 for financial reasons. It held a festival at the hall in 2011. From 1984 onwards, various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course, before once more becoming a private family home, with outbuildings converted to private houses.
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity, in October 2007, and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had been restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust. An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund. As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair. The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.
The mansion is faced with Bath stone, limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with Coade stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs. It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751–1752. On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by Joseph Rose, Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758–1759 by Capability Brown. The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases. King George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon. A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room. This was designed in 1763–1771, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by François Boucher and Maurice Jacques, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins. Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. The Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and door surrounds in 1949; they were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959, the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats. A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original. As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room; the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.
At the west side of the building is a Long Gallery[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ). It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton. As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust and leased to the National Trust, which operates it as a tourist attraction. The National Trust owns the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s. Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.
George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate in 1751, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate. It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work", and it is an important and seminal work. It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire). Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards. The house was visited by George III, as well as by Queen Victoria during summers when she was a child, and George V (when Duke of York).
A jam factory was built near Pershore railway station by the 9th Earl of Coventry in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam-making had ceased, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust during the First World War to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station. The First World War deeply affected Croome; there were many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the county, who needed a residence for his many official engagements. Croome Court was requisitioned during the Second World War by the Ministry of Works, and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed for two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.
The Croome Estate Trust sold the Court in 1948, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns from 1950 until 1979. In 1979, the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON, the Hare Krishna movement) which used it as its UK headquarters and a training college, called Chaitanya College. During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room. ISKCON left the estate in 1984 for financial reasons. It held a festival at the hall in 2011. From 1984 onwards, various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course, before once more becoming a private family home, with outbuildings converted to private houses.
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity, in October 2007, and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had been restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust. An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund. As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair. The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.
The mansion is faced with Bath stone, limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with Coade stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs. It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751–1752. On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by Joseph Rose, Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758–1759 by Capability Brown. The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases. King George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon. A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room. This was designed in 1763–1771, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by François Boucher and Maurice Jacques, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins. Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. The Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and door surrounds in 1949; they were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959, the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats. A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original. As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room; the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.
At the west side of the building is a Long Gallery[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ). It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton. As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery.
Tip by
B
5.43 km
End point
Parking
Way Types & Surfaces
Way Types
3.29 km
1.19 km
759 m
193 m
Surfaces
4.57 km
363 m
302 m
122 m
< 100 m
< 100 m
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Wednesday 8 July
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16°C
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