The McAshan (mác-a-shan) Herb Gardens at Festival Hill are part of the extensive gardens located on the campus of the Round Top Festival Institute in Round Top, Texas.
The main garden in the McAshan Gardens is the Cloister Garden. The background is a folly ruin built to look like an ancient church. The focus of the garden is a statue of Mary and the plantings include many herbs, bulbs, shrubs and spring blooming annuals such as poppies, larkspurs and petunias.
Nearby are the Mediterranean Garden with lavenders, thymes and oreganos, and the walled beds with sages, bay laurels, myrtle and yerba mate.
The Madalene Hill Pharmacy Garden contains medicinal plants arranged by their geographical origin. It is said that more than 75% of the world’s population still obtains its medicines from plants. Admire the rare Melaleuca from Australia, Zatar (Thymbra spicata) from the Mediterranean and the unique Wolfberry (Lycium barbarum) in the China collection. Other rare plants from Africa, India, Mexico, South America, Asia, and Europe are growing here, as well as North American species used by Native Americans.
Other plantings include a Shakespeare Garden, Fiber and Dye Garden and a large collection of potted tropical spice, fruit and ornamental plants.
For more information about the gardens at Festival Hill contact info@festivalhill.org or call 979-249-3129.
Location: the gardens are on the right as you enter the road to the main buildings
248 Jaster Road Round Top, Texas 78954
map of the campus
