History - The Present Day

Aberglasney Restoration Trust

While Aberglasney’s very existence was unknown to the world in general (many local people remaining unaware of it), a small band of enthusiasts of historic houses and gardens had long kept an informal watching brief on the property, noting its decline with increasing concern.

Eventually they formed the Trust, and at the eleventh hour realized their ambitions to save Aberglasney when an American benefactor donated the purchase price. This primed the pump for a gruelling series of feasibility studies and grant applications to give Aberglasney a new lease of life.

The ambitious restoration strategy has drawn on the skills of experts in many spheres. All available sources were examined to uncover Aberglasney’s history, but much remained (and still remains) unknown. Only when repairs were well underway and the stone structures made safe could major archaeology begin.

Findings in 1998-1999 proved that the Cloister garden did indeed date from the late Tudor and early Stewart era. The process of discovery continues, just as the exciting new plantings grow into place bringing new life to old spaces.

Aberglasney is changing and growing - a garden lost in time no longer, a garden of past, present and future.