Over the years, Elle Decor has opened the gates to some of the most breathtaking gardens in the world—spaces that blur the lines between landscape, art, and fantasy. There’s Pierre Bergé and Yves Saint Laurent’s Eden-like French estate, which is dripping in German irises and perfectly clipped parterres. In Monaco, designer John-Mark Horton transformed a tri-level garden overlooking the Mediterranean into a fragrant escape of romantic decay. And in East Hampton, Ina Garten’s gardens are an idyllic explosion of dahlias, white hydrangeas, and, if you visit her 25-tree orchard in May, apple blossoms.
These are gardens shaped by the personal obsessions of aesthetes who treat the outdoors with the same care as their interiors. Indeed, a garden isn’t just a place to grow things and show off your horticultural prowess, it’s a reminder that beauty can be cultivated over years, even decades, and that slowing down to watch something bloom is always worth it.
Whether you’re designing your dream landscape or just looking for a little green escape, these gardens from the pages of Elle Decor offer plenty of inspiration. Just be warned: You may find yourself searching obsessively for vintage urns, or whispering sweet nothings to your hydrangeas. We won’t judge.
Rachel Silva is the associate digital editor at ELLE DECOR, where she covers all things design, architecture, and lifestyle. She also oversees the publication’s feature article coverage, and is, at any moment, knee-deep in an investigation on everything from the to the on the internet right now. She has more than 16 years of experience in editorial, working as a photo assignment editor at Time and acting as the president of Women in Media in NYC. She went to Columbia Journalism School, and her work has been nominated for awards from ASME, the Society of Publication Designers, and World Press Photo.