Background

St Peters Town and Country Garden Tours have been an annual event in Armidale for many decades. Through all the vagaries of New England weather - drought, hailstorms, rainstorms, late frosts, wild winters, mild winters - the gardens have brought pleasure to a great many visitors, year in year out.

Each year we are fortunate to have new gardens in our program as well as a few old favourites. Gardeners from many different areas of the district have been justly proud to open their gardens to the public, with plantings suited to our climatic conditions, demonstrating their skills in design, their undoubted hard work and their generosity in sharing their creations with us.

Every year parishioners and the wider community assist in the running of the weekend. Without their help we could not produce the lunches, morning and afternoon teas, plant stalls, handicraft stalls, cake stalls, musical entertainment … which make the weekend so much more fun.

As a fundraiser, this weekend has been a great success. We have been able to support the building of our new Parish Centre and the work in the parish with the young and elderly. In recent years we have given donations to the Armidale Hospital Palliative Care Unit, the Anglican Counselling Service, the Beginning Experience, the Parenting Network and the Challenge Foundation.

Our thanks go to the garden owners, the Armidale community, parishioners of St Peters, and to the visitors from far and near.