‘A fascinating and intimate portrait of a garden over time … Reading is like being given a rusty key to a beautiful secret garden.’ - Ben Dark, Author of The Grove

Hidden away behind high stone walls in the centre of London is Lambeth Palace Garden, a 10-acre site that has been continuously cultivated for more than a thousand years.

Join Head Gardener Nick Stewart Smith as he unlocks the gates and invites us to wander through a secret garden where nature is at the heart of everything and where a thoughtful approach to gardening creates a haven for all sorts of native wildlife, allowing nature to flourish in the midst of one of the world’s busiest cities.

The Thousand Year Old Garden is a comforting meditation through the seasons on the act of renewal, hope, gardening, and our place in nature.

‘It is a fascinating read and best of all, with appetite whetted, the reader can arrange to visit the garden which opens to the public through the National Garden Scheme.’

‘A unique insight into a special place, written with tenderness and passion by a gardener with a real eye for detail.’

‘Readers will have their interest piqued by this captivating work, and can visit the garden to see for themselves (though Lambeth Palace itself is closed for refurbishment).’

‘Steward Smith professes not to be a writer but his easy, conversational style married with an extraordinary eye for horticultural, historical and even personal detail belies this.’

‘His book is like the contented conversation between two people sharing a bench: ruminative, tangential, full of wisdom.’

A most charming and original story of a gardener and his garden

‘A wonderful grasp of the natural world, and the delicate balance between the cultivated and the wildlings, and the gardener's role in bringing out the best of both.’

‘To read this book is to see the world through the eyes of a gardener ... the tender wisdom and lyrical detail will entrance you.’

‘A fascinating and intimate portrait of a garden over time. Nick's descriptions of the tasks and tribulations of life as Lambeth Palace's head gardener are lovingly described, and better yet, serve as a starting point for anecdotes, stories and speculation drawn from a millennium of green life on the banks of the Thames. Reading is like being given a rusty key to a beautiful secret garden.’

NICK STEWART SMITH has been a gardener all of his working life. He has a degree from Warwick University and has previously trained and worked in Barcelona at the historic Ciutadella Park, and as National Trust Head Gardener at Overbecks, a stunning subtropical garden on the Devon coast. Returning home to London, at the beginning of 2016 he was asked to take charge of the old garden at Lambeth Palace, where he remained until summer 2022. He now works as a freelancer, living between Camberwell and Peckham.