Central Gardens form the middle link in Bournemouth's celebrated chain of Victorian pleasure gardens, a green corridor that follows the Bourne stream from the seafront Lower Gardens, through the town centre, up towards the Upper Gardens and Coy Pond on the edge of Westbourne. Laid out over a former marshy valley, they're one of the oldest and most enduring pieces of the resort's original Victorian design.
History
The transformation of the Bourne valley into ornamental gardens began in the 1840s, when the architect Decimus Burton advised on laying out the pleasure grounds as Bournemouth grew from a scattering of villas into a fashionable health resort. The Central and Lower Gardens took their present shape after a design competition held in 1872, won by Philip Henry Tree, and the land passed into council ownership the following year. The banks of the Bourne stream itself were lined with stonework by the firm of Pulham and Son in 1898, work that still shapes the watercourse today.
What to see & do
The gardens' best-known feature is Bournemouth's war memorial, unveiled on 8 November 1922 and designed by architect E.A. Shervey with sculpture by W.A. Hoare, honouring residents lost in the First World War and later conflicts. Nearby, a pergola added over the bridge in 1990, for the centenary of the Borough of Bournemouth, reuses ironwork salvaged from a Victorian veranda, a nice piece of continuity between the gardens' 19th- and 20th-century histories. Elsewhere in the gardens you'll find tennis courts available for hire and a small children's play area, alongside the lawns, mature trees and flowerbeds that run the length of the valley.
Visiting
The Central Gardens are open access, free to enter and simple to combine with a walk between the town centre and the sea. The Bourne Valley Greenway path runs through them, making them easy to explore on foot or by bike as part of a longer route towards Westbourne and Coy Pond. There's no admission charge; the only cost within the gardens is for booking a tennis court.
Just downstream sit the Lower Gardens, with their mini-golf and bandstand on the way to the pier, while the Upper Gardens continue the valley walk towards Westbourne. They're a lovely, quiet stretch of the wider gardens network, see more ideas in our guide to things to do in Bournemouth.
