Rathbone Garden Centre

This garden centre has a real community spirit about it and I have enjoyed coming here on several occasions. It always seems quite busy here and I think that it is quite popular with the locals. They have some lovely plants for sale and they are all grown here too, which is nice to know as some garden centres buy in their plants. The prices are fairly reasonable too and all of the plants have been in good condition when I have been in. Inside the shop they have a variety of plant care products and seeds, which are always useful if you grow your own plants. The people that run the place are really friendly and definitely know their stuff when it comes to plants. They are always willing to offer help and advice. It is a great little place and definitely worth a visit.

This is a great little independent garden centre and one with a social conscience, so well worth supporting. It’s tucked away halfway up the Umberslade Road, and chances are you may even have passed it without knowing what it is as most of the activity takes place on the large piece of land that sits behind the houses that this place is sandwiched between. The front entrance is a fairly anonymous set of green municipal iron gates and only a small sign tells you that this is, in fact, a garden centre.
The place is run by a charity that helps young people with a variety of issues and provides them with horticultural training. As such, all of the plants that that are for sale in the centre have been grown in the nursery out the back. There are a decent selection of plants for sales, ranging from potted, decorative varieties to shrubs, bushes and trees. We bought a cherry tree there last year and for a very reasonable £10 and it’s still going strong in our garden. There is a small office/​shop that stocks a small selection of branded products, like seeds and fertilisers, and these are also fairly reasonably priced. I often pop down there for bits of cane, or bags of compost, as well as to browse for plants to go into the areas of my garden that I am slowly starting to reclaim from the ivy and the weeds. The guys that run the place are knowledgeable and friendly and I always enjoy having a chat with them over green-​fingered matters. It also feels good to be giving your money to and supporting a worthy cause. Highly recommended