Virginia’s Historic Garden Week — the only statewide house and garden tour in the country — runs April 20-27. It will have more than 30 tours across Virginia, with almost a third of those in or near Hampton Roads.
The featured properties change each year, making the tour a unique opportunity for garden lovers, history buffs and the curious who want a peek inside historic sites, private homes and gardens. Ticket proceeds go to restoring and preserving historic public gardens and landscapes; 129 projects at more than 50 public spaces have been completed.
Dates and ticket prices for each tour vary. We’ve included prices for advance tickets; tickets bought the day of the event will be $10 more. The full schedule can be found and tickets purchased at vagardenweek.org.
Here, taken from the guidebook, is a list of stops in the Hampton Roads area. The guidebook, available at vagardenweek.org/guidebook, has suggested itineraries and other historic sites to visit.
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Gloucester-Mathews
Saturday. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets, $50. This is a shuttle-only tour except for the Fine Arts Museum of Gloucester, 6894 Main St. Tour headquarters for River Promise and Paget is the T.C. Walker Education Center, 6099 T.C. Walker Road, Gloucester. Shuttles to the Mazzocco Home run from Ware River Yacht Club, 5992 Ware Point Road, Gloucester.
Sunday. 10 a.m.- 4 p.m. A separate ticket, $30, allows access to Gardens at Goshen, 7628 Goshen Lane, Gloucester.
The Mazzocco Home. The home is a modern take on a traditional house with spare, clean lines that create an open and airy feeling. A large porch offers sweeping views of the Ware River. The property covers about 11 acres and includes gardens.
River Promise. Overlooking the Ware, River Promise was built in a classic Victorian style in 1987. The current owner and her husband purchased the property in 2005 years after a hurricane destroyed the property’s only tree. The couple are members of the American Conifer Society and began planting more than 100 trees on the property, including conifers, elms, crape myrtles, Japanese maples and bald cypress.
Paget. This Federal-style house was built in 1928 with the main level designed as one large room surrounding a central chimney; in the 1930s it became a fitting site for a summer camp for boys. The gardens include oaks, magnolias, pines, fruit trees, heirloom and cultivar azaleas, rhododendrons and boxwoods.
Fine Arts Museum of Gloucester. Opened in June after the Cook Foundation acquired more than 300 works and artifacts by Kacey Carneal (1935-2022), a folk artist who painted at her Gloucester home every day for nearly 50 years.
The Gardens at Goshen. Goshen (circa 1750) was originally the home of the Tomkies family. “Goshen” means a “place of plenty.” The current owner and her husband purchased the property in 1987 and started restoring the house and gardens. Reduced in size since Colonial times, the property covers about 400 acres, with the lawns and gardens taking about 40 acres.
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Suffolk
Saturday. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets, $35. Pick up the tour wristband at event headquarters, Suffolk Elks Lodge, 329 W. Constance Road.
The Gay House. 515 W. Riverview Drive. This Colonial Revival was built in 1938 and is curated with Southern, French and English antiques. The main floor has its original random-width plank flooring with the pegs intact, 10½-foot ceilings, transom windows and heavy molding. Carved woodwork enhances the archways in the living room, dining room and entrance hall.
501 N. Broad St. (garden only). The back garden of the Gallotta property includes a slate courtyard surrounded by hydrangeas with a trellis of jasmine. Propagation beds were added with English boxwood, holly, beautyberry, oak saplings and more.
724 W. Riverview. The two-story white brick home has been described as a modified Colonial and English country house. The proportioned and spacious rooms have deep-set windows, arched double doorways and wide crown dentil molding. An herb garden in the front has climbing roses; the backyard has pergolas, trellises and a raised kitchen garden surrounding a pool with climbing roses and smilax.
805 W. Riverview Drive. This Georgian-style home, built in 1923, features bilateral symmetry inside and out. The interior has an open foyer with large pocket doors, and original French doors to the side porch and the side sunroom. It has a guest house with attached garden sheds. The home hosts a 120-year-old magnolia tree and three beech trees that are over 100 years old.
726 Jones St. This Georgian-style home was built in 1950 by a camellia enthusiast. The current owners bought the house 12 years ago and have worked to restore the garden and its hundreds of camellias. Updates include a new parterre, antique brick walkways and two extensive flower borders with lamb’s ear, gaura, hydrangeas, lady’s mantle, anemones, fatsia, ferns and more.
813 Dumville Ave. This Colonial Revival home was built in 1946, and the original garden has been maintained in the front. In August 2020, a tornado destroyed the rear garden; the site has been renovated and includes boxwoods, roses, herbs, perennials and annuals, and ornamental, deciduous and evergreen trees.
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Historic Berkeley, Shirley and Westover
Sunday and Monday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tickets, $60. A self-driving and walking tour. Along the James River, off Route 5 in Charles City County.
Historic Berkeley. 12602 Harrison Landing Road. The Georgian mansion, built in 1726, sits on a hilltop overlooking the James River. The estate is the birthplace of Benjamin Harrison, signer of the Declaration of Independence and governor of Virginia, and William Henry Harrison, the ninth U.S. president; and is the ancestral home of William Henry’s grandson, Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president. Berkeley’s gardens and lawn extend a quarter mile from the front door to the riverbank.
Historic Shirley. 501 Shirley Plantation Road. The home represents the early American history of the Indigenous, colonizers, indentured and enslaved. Established six years after John Smith’s settlement at Jamestown in 1607, it is the oldest family-owned business in North America, dating to 1638. Grounds contain eight original outbuildings with exhibits. Notable landscape features include an oak tree alley entrance, pastoral views, boxwood gardens, vegetable and herb beds, native sun garden, grape arbor and stately trees.
Historic Westover. 7000 Westover Road. A premier example of Georgian architecture, Westover has an elegant yet simple form, best viewed from the edge of the front lawn. Grounds include a large formal garden arranged around William Byrd II’s marble tomb, outbuildings such as a five-hole privy, escape tunnel and icehouse, and three English wrought-iron gates. Westover has been featured in Historic Garden Week almost continuously since 1929.
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Williamsburg
Tuesday. 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tickets, $40. A shuttle tour of three homes with gardens in the Walnut Hills neighborhood and a guided tour of two Colonial Williamsburg homes and the historic area’s gardens. Tour headquarters is the Colonial Williamsburg Visitor Center, 101 Visitors Center Drive.
The Darling House. The Georgian-style home on four acres boasts mature native trees, including a walk-under juniper that was the Darling siblings’ imaginary play garden. The house was built in 1937 by Max Reig, Colonial Williamsburg’s pewtersmith and silversmith, with antique bricks repurposed from a Newport News brewery.
The Stephens House. This contemporary home is on a corner lot with a matching pair of Japanese maples. It includes the family’s love of modern and antique wooden pieces, including a dining room table built from the flooring of the University of North Carolina gym and dining room chairs that are Asian, Scandinavian and Mission-inspired.
The Towler House. This Colonial Revival home has large windows and sits on an expansive lawn shaded by towering white oak and Japanese maple trees. Brick pathways provide boundaries for woodland shrubs and shade-loving plants in the front and back gardens.
Travis House. 345 W. Francis St. Built about 1765, the house has a long gambrel roof and single brick end. The west portion of the house was built first, with two additions built before the 19th century. When the building transferred to the Williamsburg Holding Corp. in 1928, it was a residence for the superintendent of Eastern State Hospital. The building was moved to Duke of Gloucester Street in 1929 and operated as a tavern. It was returned to its original location in 1968.
The Red Lion. 201 E. Duke of Gloucester St. The Red Lion was reconstructed in 1938 on the foundation of the original 1720-25 structure. The supporting structures, built in the same period, did not include a kitchen building. This was rare in Williamsburg but not unheard of. The house was used for various purposes in the 18th century, including a tavern. It housed an antiques store after its reconstruction.
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Poquoson, Hampton, Newport News
Wednesday. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets, $45. This is a partial shuttle tour; the Burcher Home can be accessed only with the shuttle from tour headquarters, Poquoson Museum, 968 Poquoson Ave.
28 Wagner Road (garden only). Mature willow oaks, river birch and sweet bay magnolias line the driveway to this 3½-acre home on a creek off the Poquoson River. It includes a garden house, fish cleaning area, and boat dock with pathways lined with asparagus fern, sea grasses, iris, coleus and numerous birdhouses.
104 Browns Neck Road. The homeowners built this modern one-story home to fit the curving point on White House Cove. The nearly 3-acre property has about 489 feet of shoreline with views of one of Poquoson’s most traveled waterways.
7 Crescent Point. The owners built this classic brick Georgian home on a lot across the street from its present location. They decided to live on the water and had the house moved – all while the home was fully furnished and decorated.
15 Crescent Point. Natural and reflected light infuses this transitional brick home on 3 acres surrounded by marsh and woodlands on White House Cove. High gloss lacquer paint in the dining and living rooms and pearlized wallpapers reflect the light.
The Burcher Home. This 964-square-foot, midcentury modern home sits on a half-acre manufactured peninsula, jutting into a bay bordered by Bennetts Creek and Floyds Bay. L. Cornell Burcher commissioned it to be designed in 1965 by Ling Po, an apprentice of Frank Lloyd Wright. The home was designed in the Usonian style and takes advantage of the water views surrounding it..
The York/Poquoson Master Gardeners Learning Garden. 968 Poquoson Ave. The Virginia Cooperative Extension York/Poquoson Master Gardeners established the Poquoson Learning Garden in partnership with the Poquoson Museum in 2013. The gardeners promote sustainable landscaping with native plants, trees and shrubs, and pollinators.
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Virginia Beach
Wednesday. Morning tour 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.; afternoon tour, 1:30 to 5 p.m. Tickets, $50. Trolley-based tour. A two-day ticket, Virginia Beach and Norfolk, is $80. Trolley tour and headquarters are at the Princess Anne Country Club, 3800 Pacific Ave.
The McCaa Home. Bright pinks and greens mix with other bold colors to create a home that is a creative hub for three active kids. Whimsical wonders include reclaimed doors found on antique shopping trips and an antique kimono hung as a work of art. The backyard, shaded by old-growth trees and mature azaleas, is a child’s wonderland.
The McCarty Home. The architecture was inspired by cedar shake homes on the Outer Banks and cottages on Cape Cod. Works by local artists hang throughout.
The Battaglia Home. Oiled white oak floors lead to a spectacular open kitchen and living area with custom woodwork and handmade clay tilework. The backyard has ipe decking and an outdoor fireplace.
The Denton Home. Built in 1937, this house has been restored. French Provençal antiques sit alongside 18th- and 19th-century American case pieces passed down through generations.
The Brock Garden. The garden is for a private residence and was designed by the owner’s daughter, a landscape architect. It has shaded spots for serene moments and open swaths for entertaining.
The Goodman Home. The home has a lush, award-winning garden on one side and the Atlantic Ocean on the other. The formal garden spans two lots with shaded places among the papyrus and a sun-filled yard buffered by the largest dune in Virginia Beach.
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Norfolk
Thursday. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets, $45. The tour includes homes or gardens on the same street in the Lochhaven neighborhood. A two-day ticket, Virginia Beach and Norfolk, is $80. Admission to the Virginia Zoo and Norfolk Botanical Garden are included. Tour headquarters is the Hermitage Museum & Gardens, 7637 North Shore Road, and includes activities including garden tours and tree seedling giveaways. On-street parking is available at Second Presbyterian Church at 7305 Hampton Blvd. and throughout the neighborhood.
7640 North Shore Road. This two-story Dutch Colonial home was built in 1952. It has been updated several times but retains many original features, including its slate roof, wood siding and hardwood oak floors.
7700 North Shore Road (garden only). This primarily shade-loving garden is filled with native plants and poet’s laurel, heirloom azaleas, camellias, ferns and hydrangeas. It features a small koi pond and a weathered statue of St. Francis.
7477 North Shore Road (garden only). The gardens at this Arts and Craft/Tudor-style home overlook the Lafayette River. After three years of renovating the 1912 residence, the owners have been establishing planting areas and garden rooms while being mindful of the property’s legacy plants, shrubs and trees.
7474 North Shore Road. This Colonial Revival home was built in 1929. Four decades after its construction, it was the residence of the president and co-founder of the Dalton-Bundy Lumber Co. The house retains its original hardwood flooring, a horsehair and plaster medallion on the dining room ceiling, and double brick walls partially exposed in the kitchen.
7471 North Shore Road. Built in 2002, this Hamptons-style cottage offers views of the Lafayette River and the shores of the Hermitage. The back of the house includes a large porch overlooking the river and a garden filled with hydrangeas, peonies, roses, black-eyed Susans and daylilies.
7464 North Shore Road (garden only). It is a courtyard garden in the Charleston style. It features a fountain and a multilevel entertaining space.
7446 North Shore Road. This 8,800-square-foot Colonial brick home was built in 1951. Lush landscaping around the all-brick patio includes a live oak tree, bronze trellis, hydrangea garden, brick koi pond with waterfalls and fountain, and a 50-foot heated saltwater gunite lap pool.
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Middle Peninsula-Essex County
Friday. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets, $35. Print out tickets; internet connection is unreliable. Self-driving tour.
Little Egypt, 515 Faulconer Road, Tappahannock. Two-hundred-year-old cedar trees and mature shrubbery make this 3-acre property serene. Little Egypt was built in the 1750s and may have served as a tavern at some point. The earliest structure was a “one-over-one” with a central hall and fireplace under a gambrel roof.
Thornbury, 653 N. Church Lane, Tappahannock. Thornbury is a stately two-story Greek Revival-style home built between 1915 and 1920. It was named after the home of the original owner’s mother in Thornbury, England. At the entrance stand two lions weighing 700 pounds each, made of cast stone. The home overlooks the Rappahannock River.
The Essex Inn, 203 Duke St., Tappahannock. Once known as the Roane-Wright-Trible house, this brick Georgian mansion was built in 1850 by Dr. Roane. It has gone through significant renovations and opened as the Essex Inn. The distinguished Greek Revival style structure of white stucco over brick sits atop a high English basement.
Wheatland, 1154 Wheatland Road, Loretto. Wheatland sits on farmland overlooking the Rappahannock River. It was built in 1848 by an ancestor of the current owners. The drive leads to a setting of ancient pecan and poplar trees, including an Osage Orange tree once designated as having the largest circumference in Virginia. An English boxwood allée leads to the river’s edge, where a steamboat wharf was constructed in the 1890s and rebuilt in 1916 after a fire. It is the only one still in existence in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
Mountcastle House, 829 Brooks Bank Road, Loretto. This modern farmhouse, completed in 2022, sits high above the Rappahannock. More than 100 works of art, including paintings and sculptures, are throughout the home and include pieces by nationally recognized and local artists in styles ranging from traditional landscape to contemporary to abstract.
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Eastern Shore
April 27. 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tickets, $40. Self-driving tour.
Chatham, 8218 Chatham Road. Machipongo. Chatham was built in 1818. Maj. Scarborough Pitts named his house after William Pitt, the first Earl of Chatham. The nearly 300-acre farm has a mile of waterfront on Church Creek and was placed in the Virginia Land Trust in 2008.
Eyre Hall, 3215 Eyre Hall Drive, Cheriton. The historic property, completed in 1758, offers a rare picture of Colonial plantation living. Eyre Hall’s preservation lies in its descent through eight generations of a family. The garden has crape myrtles towering above parterres enclosed by boxwood and set off by colorful mixed borders. Beyond the house and garden are broad fields and views over Cherrystone Creek.
Eyre Rectory, 6520 Indiantown Road, Eastville. Built in the 1850s, this home was the rectory for Christ Church in Eastville and Hungars Church in Bridgetown until 1908. John Eyre paid for construction. The property may have been a part of the Underground Railroad.
72 Creekside Lane, Cape Charles. Constructed in 2022, the home has classically inspired features. Notable interior features include 10-foot ceilings, a Chippendale staircase, floor-to-ceiling bookcases and natural finished oak floors. A Virginia bluestone terrace leads to oyster-shell garden paths and a garden of hydrangeas, roses, crape myrtles, abelia and herbs.
100 Creekside Lane, Cape Charles (garden only). A shell path leads through hostas and ground coverings including pachysandra, periwinkle and liriope. Flower accents of daffodil, calla lily, Siberian iris and hydrangea contrast the backdrop of hollies and conifers.
606 Carousel Place, Cape Charles. This traditional home with bayfront views was built in 2020. The homeowners created functional spaces, from an artful, open wood stairway to reclaimed doors turned into cabinetry. The second floor features a kitchen, dining, living and sunrooms. New Ravenna mosaics accent several spaces, including the butler’s pantry and powder room.
