The Jardins de Valloires (8 hectares) are

botanical garden A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...

s located on the grounds of the 18th century Abbaye de Valloires in

Argoules Argoules () is a commune in the Somme department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Geography The commune is situated north of Abbeville Abbeville (, vls, Abbekerke, pcd, Advile) is a commune in the Somme department and in Haut ...

Somme __NOTOC__ Somme or The Somme may refer to: Places *Somme (department), a department of France *Somme, Queensland, Australia *Canal de la Somme, a canal in France *Somme (river), a river in France Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Somme'' (book), a ...

Picardy Picardy (; Picard and french: Picardie, , ) is a historical territory and a former administrative region of France. Since 1 January 2016, it has been part of the new region of Hauts-de-France. It is located in the northern part of France. Hi ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. They are classified as a ''

Jardin Remarquable The Remarkable Gardens of France is intended to be a list and description, by region, of the more than three hundred gardens classified as ''"Jardins remarquables"'' by the Ministry of Culture and the Comité des Parcs et Jardins de Fr ...

'', and open daily in the warmer months; an admission fee is charged. The gardens' origins date to 1981 when gardener Jean-Louis Cousin began to look for a site for his collection of 3000 plant varieties from

north Asia North Asia or Northern Asia, also referred to as Siberia, is the northern region of Asia, which is defined in geographical terms and is coextensive with the Asian part of Russia, and consists of three Russian regions east of the Ural Mountains: ...

and

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

. In 1985 the region of Picardy, department of the Somme, and the ''Syndicat Mixte pour l’Aménagement de la Côte Picarde'' (Joint Committee for the Management of the Coast of Picardy) agreed to build a new garden beside the Abbey of Valloires. Starting in 1987, the gardens were designed by

Gilles Clément Gilles Clément (born at Argenton-sur-Creuse, Indre, France in 1943), is a French gardener, garden designer, botanist, entomologist and writer. He is the author of several concepts in the framework of landscaping of the end of the twentieth centu ...

, who also designed the

Parc André Citroën Parc André Citroën is a public park located on the left bank of the river Seine in the 15th arrondissement of Paris. Built on the site of a former Citroën automobile manufacturing plant, the park is named after company founder André Citroën ...

and the Jardin botanique du domaine du Rayol, and first opened to the public in 1989, with additional gardens created in subsequent years. Today the gardens contain over 5,000 plant

taxa In biology, a taxon (back-formation from ''taxonomy''; plural taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit. Although neither is required, a taxon is usually known by a particular nam ...

, representing 75 botanical families, 698

genera Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomenclat ...

, and 2,030

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

, with an emphasis on plants native to

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

, and

Central Asia Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...

. They are organized into three major sections: * French gardens, to harmonize with the abbey's west facade * English gardens (''jardins des îles''), containing botanical collections organized into "islands" * a wilder, naturalistic garden. Points of interest include a

rose A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be ...

garden containing 200 varieties of modern and ancient roses, medicinal garden,

vegetable Vegetables are parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. The original meaning is still commonly used and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including the flowers, fruits, stems, ...

garden, garden of evolution (6000 m², opened in 2003) in honor of local scientist

Jean-Baptiste Lamarck Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck (1 August 1744 – 18 December 1829), often known simply as Lamarck (; ), was a French naturalist, biologist, academic, and soldier. He was an early proponent of the idea that biologi ...

, and garden of five senses. The gardens contain a national collection of

Rubus ''Rubus'' is a large and diverse genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, subfamily Rosoideae, with over 1,350 species. Raspberries, blackberries, and dewberries are common, widely distributed members of the genus. Most of these ...

recognized by the ''Conservatoire des Collections Végétales Spécialisées'' (CCVS), as well as a collection of 98

Viburnum ''Viburnum'' is a genus of about 150–175 species of flowering plants in the moschatel family Adoxaceae. Its current classification is based on molecular phylogeny. It was previously included in the honeysuckle family Caprifoliaceae. The membe ...

varieties. In addition, the rose garden contains three special varieties related to the site: the ''Jardins de Valloires'' created by André Eve and formally named in 1992 by

Catherine Deneuve Catherine Fabienne Dorléac (born 22 October 1943), known professionally as Catherine Deneuve (, , ), is a French actress as well as an occasional singer, model, and producer, considered one of the greatest European actresses. She gained recogni ...

, the ''Rose des Cisterciens'' created by Delbard in 1998 in honor of the 900th anniversary of the Cistercian Order, and the ''Rose of Picardy'' created in 2004 by David Austin.

References

Jardins de Valloires

Abbaye de Valloires (French)

GardenVisit entry

Wikimapia entry
* Sonia Lesot and Henri Gaud, ''Les Jardins de Valloires: De la plante à la planète'', Editions Gaud, 2006. . * Alessandro Rocca (ed), ''Planetary Gardens: The Landscape Architecture of Gilles Clément'', Birkhäuser Basel, 2008. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Valloires, Jardins de Gardens in Somme (department) Botanical gardens in France

See also

References