Mannington Estate

Our walks and Car Park are open every day from 9am – dusk with a charge of £2.00 for parking. There is an Honesty Box by the Visitor’s Centre. Dogs on leads or under close control are welcome.

A wide variety of habitats may be accessed by following an extensive network of way-marked public and permissive footpaths. These trails take you into ancient and coppice woodland, wet wildflower meadows, unimproved grassland, and green lanes and reveal many historic buildings. There is an arboretum of native trees only a short walk from the visitor centre.

A boardwalk gives access to a 4.3 hectare wet wildflower meadow rich in wildlife. Hunting barn owls, harvest mice, 75 species of plants and abundant butterflies are just some of the things to be seen. An observation hide with wheelchair access looks across a tranquil stretch of water where edible frogs, kingfishers, and otters may be seen. Please take special care near veteran trees and all water courses.

Care must be taken as electric fences are used. All grazing is let, and livestock are not owned by the Estate.

Boardwalk through a meadow provides access to the countryside and our wheelchair-accessible bird hide. We also have wheelchair accessible lavatories at the Visitor’s Centre.

The gardens at Mannington will be open for the season from Wednesday 17th May – Friday 1st September 2023.

Opening Hours:Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays 11am – 5pm.
17th May – 1st September. (Please note that the tearooms are open 11am – 4pm).

17th May – 1st September. (Please note that the tearooms are open 11am – 4pm).

Admission: £10.00 adult £8.00 concessions (senior/student/carer)
Children under 16 Free.
Entrance ticket gives admission for two open days within one week.
Free for RHS and HHA members (please bring membership cards).

The gardens around the medieval moated manor feature a wide variety of plants, trees and shrubs in different settings. Throughout the gardens are many roses, especially classic varieties. In the Heritage and Modern Rose Gardens are roses in designs reflecting their date and origin. On the South Lawn is a classic temple and the Sensory Garden with water feature and plants selected for touch, sound and taste, scent and colour.

Wildflowers are encouraged around the lakes and ruined chapel. Unusual trees and shrubs are featured throughout

Whether your group spends the whole day, or just an hour on the Estate, we all hope you will have an enjoyable and memorable visit.

The renowned Heritage Rose Garden was created largely by Lord Walpole in the 1980s and has over 1,000 varieties of roses arranged in their date of origin. Along with the formal gardens there is also a wildflower meadow which has over 150 species of flora, with boardwalks and bird hides. You can also visit the ruins of a Saxon chapel and there is an outstanding array of native and foreign tree species. The gardens and bird hide are accessible by wheelchair.

It seems that there have always been roses at Mannington, but the present collection was developed by the late Lord Walpole with much help from noted rose grower, Peter Beales.

The Heritage Rose Garden, laid out from 1980, features roses in settings reflecting their period of origin from medieval to modern. Elsewhere in the garden roses are grown in pots, up trees as well as in beds and borders.

For further information on Historic Roses visit to Historic Roses.

Refreshments are available in the tearooms when the gardens are open (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday) and will close one hour before the gardens close. (Tearooms Hours 11am – 4pm)

A selection of hot and cold drinks, homemade light lunches, freshly baked cakes and other snacks are available.

We try to cater for all dietaries in the tearooms, however as all our food is freshly made, items can run out. If you have a specific dietary restriction, please let us know beforehand so that we can make sure we have items that you can eat.

As of April 2022, the tearooms at Mannington have been run by Lady Walpole’s daughter, Grace.

Last year she returned home to Norfolk and also runs her own catering business, Walpole’s Kitchen. For more information or to book, please take a look at her website walpoleskitchen.co.uk.

If you have any special requests such as a Picnic or an Afternoon Tea, perhaps a Birthday Cake or even Canapés and Champagne for a proposal, please do get in touch to discuss your ideas and options.

Few areas can boast such varied habitats with old and new woodland, wet meadow, scrub, grassland and cultivated sections. Watercourses include ancient Lakes (undoubtedly once medieval fishponds providing fresh food for the household); Scrape at the end of the Boardwalk created in the 1980s, as well as the moat fed by a stream which flows to Itteringham village through the area known as the ‘Cut’ before joining the River Bure.

At Mannington we appreciate not only the more spectacular such as orchids, owls and otters but small mammals, numerous nesting birds, bats, moths and butterflies, insects, lichens, fungi and myriad tiny wildflowers. Each season brings different pleasures with the arrival of winter and summer migrants and the changing colours of the trees.

Since the first Countryside management scheme began 40 years ago professional countryside staff have been employed to help maintain the habitats, record weather and wildlife, and interpret what can be seen by visitors including nature days for children and adults.

In 2023 we welcome back Jerry Kinsley, one of our earliest Countryside staff, who has been teaching at Easton College for many years now providing us with valuable help and advice.