When the concierge at London Syon Park, the new Waldorf Astoria, hands me my room key with the words “I don’t just open doors” italicized along the bottom, I’m intrigued. Pulling back the taffeta curtains that frame my window, she points outside to a low, gated door in the stone wall separating the hotel from its neighbours (the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland). Above it I can spot a sliver of a bridge beneath a canopy of Lebanon cedars. “We’ve automated the gate,” she says, “so you can access Syon gardens with your room key. It’s called the secret garden.”

Syon House, whose gardens have entertained the Royal Family and other “distinguished” guests for almost two centuries. (Photo: Syon Park)

I never thought I’d ditch my hotel arrival ritual (a cold Heineken from the minibar to drink in the shower – it helps fight jet lag, I swear) to hop a garden wall, but private access to parkland filled with rare trees and plants on the doorstep of a ducal estate is something to write home about. I’m no expert on gardens (my friend Stuart Webster, a landscape architect based in Montreal, is pretty serious about them: He named his daughter Siena after a hotel stay in the Tuscan hills). But I was indeed familiar with Lancelot “Capability” Brown – the celebrated landscape architect to the landed gentry (he designed the gardens at Blenheim Palace and Chatsworth as well as Kew Palace, to name a few) who created the “Syon Pleasure Ground” in the mid-18th century. And although I was keen to explore this classic storybook hidden garden with downy greens and tangle of shrubs, trees and flowers (and a parakeet thrown in for good measure), there was also the possibility of running into a duke.

Originally built as a showpiece for the 3rd Duke of Northumberland’s collection of rare plants, the Great Conservatory is still a haven for the cultivation of less hardy transplants. (Photo: Syon Park)

Swashbuckling through swamp cypresses, past woods wildly strewn with shrub roses, bluebells and camellias, I arrive at the garden’s centrepiece: the Great Conservatory. The glass-domed pavilion – something right out of Brideshead Revisited – is flooded with light, an ideal home for the hardy cacti and ferns it houses. When I stand on tiptoe I can see the lake – a slender body of water (the only still-water fishery in London) dotted with freshwater turtles and a bridge for avid anglers. In fact, it’s not unheard of to catch an eight-pound brown trout and ask executive chef Lee Streeton to cook it up for dinner. At Syon Park, the great outdoors has crept indoors:  wallpaper is adorned with flowers and vines mimicking the parkland, and the Wedgwood plates in the formal dining room (naturally named The Capability) are decorated with Syon Park’s flora and fauna. Even the sounds of bullfrogs croaking, horses neighing and roosters crowing fill the atrium connecting the guest rooms to the main building. (I’m told, many days later, that the bestial soundtrack is activated by a motion sensor.)

That afternoon, during a round of archery on the chartreuse lawn (I met my first boyfriend at 13 during an archery lesson in Eleuthera, but my mother lost his address; I’ve always suspected that was accidentally-on-purpose), I’m asked by a very clipped voice whether I’ve removed my shoes (I have) and can put them back on (immediately?). As my arrow grazes the target for the umpteenth time, it sinks in that I’m no William Tell – and that a duke may be approaching.

A shot of the Orangerie with the Swiss Ornamental Lake in the distance at the Château de Versailles, which houses more than 1,000 orange, lemon and pomegranate trees. (Photo: Miguel Angel Sanz López)

It’s easy to see how a garden like this could become the main draw of the hotel – especially when bottles of Laurent-Perrier rosé are cracked open in the greenhouse. I’ve heard it’s the lavender walk in full bloom – shoulder-high waves of fragrant violet buds – and the two Michelin stars that have guests checking into Oxfordshire’s Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons. And that savvy Roman tourists (like George Clooney) retreat to the prized possession at Hotel de Russie: a lush hillside garden complete with butterfly sanctuary and waterfall. In a few days I head off to Versailles to stay at the Trianon Palace hotel, just west of the Château de Versailles, and I’m conjuring the sweet, citrusy smell of the Orangerie when most people would be Googling the spa.

One of over 300 sculptures commissioned in 1661 to adorn the gardens. (Photo: Miguel Angel Sanz López)

You might be sleeping next door to royalty at Syon Park, but you can watch them nibble on grass in Versailles. Tucking into roasted foie gras served on a bed of tart apple and white beetroot in Gordon Ramsay’s dining room at the Trianon Palace, through the windows I watch the descendants of Marie Antoinette’s sheep grazing. Slipping out of the hotel, I’m anticipating a power walk before reaching the famous gardens and have the footwear to prove it. (After years of terrible abuse I now try to take care of my feet, especially after my father told me this: No man will marry you after seeing those up close.) At the end of the short driveway I take a right, strolling though the Grille de la Reine and along the overgrown allée as sheep bleat quietly on either side. Music wafts over tall elms trimmed to form green walls, and my pace quickens toward the source. As I round a grove lined with clipped yew hedges, I remember that André Le Nôtre – Louis XIV’s landscape architect – designed this labyrinth of trellises and tree-covered archways to surprise the spectator. Before I know it, the baroque music is deafening and I find myself standing in front of the Grand Canal, staring up at the fountains pumping water up into the sky to fall in time with the music. Le Nôtre created this quintessential French garden – the pinnacle of Baroque landscape design – to please a king; now it’s the Trianon Palace’s backyard. I wonder what he would’ve thought about my feet in his fountain.

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Where to Stay

London Syon Park is a country hideaway 11 km from Knightsbridge, where English charm and contemporary style (Versace-designed suites) get a taste of cheekiness: Brownies, the sundae bar in the lobby, serves up ice cream with scoops of liqueur on the side.
London Syon Park, Middlesex, 44-20-7870-7777, londonsyonpark.com

The Trianon Palace Versailles – less than 30 minutes from Paris – is a recently renovated Waldorf Astoria, literally next door to the Château de Versailles. The Spa Guerlain delivers the royal treatment with its transformative massages (we loved the four-hand Impériale).
1, boul. de la Reine, Versailles, 33-1-30-84-50-00, trianonpalace.com

Where to Eat

Guests of the London Syon Park can choose from the Clubhouse – a casual, open-kitchen restaurant serving up cured Sardinian meats and Mediterranean pizzas – and the Capability, a formal dining room presided over by chef Lee Streeton, who specializes in locally sourced British classics. We hoovered up a sticky toffee pudding that would put our Scottish grandmother to shame.
London Syon Park, Middlesex, 44-20-7870-7777, londonsyonpark.com

You can’t help feeling like a celebrity sliding into the enormous white leather banquettes at Gordon Ramsay at Trianon. The two-Michelin-starred restaurant prepares all the French specialties (think velvety ravioli of langoustines with Imperial beluga caviar).
1, boul. de la Reine, Versailles, 33-1-30-84-50-00, trianonpalace.com

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