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The elaborate gardens surrounding Spadina provide more than a beautiful landscape for a stately home. They are a reflection of history in which we can discover everything from household economy to middle class social values and aesthetic preferences.
The graceful front entrance with its recreated porte-cochere and formal flower beds has been reproduced using archival photographs so that it looks almost as it would have in 1905 when it was first landscaped. The bedding-out scheme changes from spring tulips to summer annuals and the plants and colours varied from year to year. The plants are limited to varieties that were available before 1982, when Albert's daughter, Anna Kathleen Thompson, moved out and restoration began.
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Spadina's plants |
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 Spadina today features more than 300 varieties of plants in an historic setting that is the result of archaeological studies on the grounds and painstaking research through family diaries, old drawings and photographs, journals, letters and stories told by members of the Austin family. Much original plant material can still be seen on the grounds; the magnificent white oaks, for instance, predate the house. Other plants still growing include the lilacs, peonies, daylilies and irises, as well as a rose identified as a Dorothy Perkins: "one of the best of the old ramblers," according to a garden writer of the Edwardian period.
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The orchard |
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| The orchard includes varieties of apples not commonly available today. The Red Astrachan is a soft dessert apple and does not keep long or ship well so it has been dropped from nursery catalogues. At the turn of the century, a nursery might list over a hundred varieties, today thirty is more likely. | 
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Excavations |
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 The archaeological excavations at Spadina revealed a system of brick-bordered cinder paths outlining a parre-terre to the north-east of the house. This parre-terre is a kitchen garden and each quadrant has a six-foot deep border of perennials around it. The area was probably a vegetable garden as far back as the Baldwin time, but was formalized with the brick and cinder paths in 1911. The intent of the planting style was to disguise the utilitarian nature of the garden when it was viewed by family guests from the formal south lawn. |
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Support |
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| The Garden Club of Toronto funded and helped to research and plan the rehabilitation of the Spadina grounds. The gardens are open to the public and included with regular admission to Spadina Museum. |
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