Suddenly we’re all about making lists. Books advise us on the 1000 books we should read before we die, or songs we should listen to, places we should go, foods we should eat. So why not a must-see garden list? We’ve decided to join the list makers and have developed a tour that takes in the greatest gardens of the world, in a whirlwind few weeks! Here are our top 10, gardens you’re welcome to join us in visiting, gardens that should be on the must-see list of any garden lover!

Kyoto’s famous moss garden can only be visited by applying in writing, many months in advance. Those lucky enough to gain entry walk paths past lush moss which is lit with a shimmering tracery of light falling through the trees overhead. In the autumn the place is ablaze with maples, their reflections burning in the lake. It is one of the oldest surviving gardens in Japan, founded in the 8th century; its present layout dates form the 14th century.

Versailles, Ile-de-France, France

Outraged that his own finance controller had created a grander garden at Vaux-le-Vicomte than anything the king himself owned, Louis XIV commissioned Versailles, a palace surrounded by a park that became the epitome of the French baroque garden. Dauntingly formal in layout, the garden comes alive when its 607 fountain and water jets burst into action.

Great Dixter, East Sussex, England

The late gardener and author Christopher Lloyd was an exuberant and opinionated character and his garden is just as colourful and unpredictable. The garden dates from 1910 when Edward Lutyens, who is often deemed the greatest British architect of the 20th century, laid out its framework at the same time as restoring the house. The garden has been developing ever since, most controversially in 1993, when Lloyd ripped out the Lutyens rose garden and replaced it with bananas, cannas and dahlias. The garden’s mix of tame and wild lends it an irresistible sense of adventure and lust for life.

Keukenhof, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands

Keukenhof means ‘kitchen’ gardens but don’t be led astray, there is nothing domestic about the scale of this enterprise which sees seven million bulbs planted annually, including one thousand different tulip varieties. As the showcase of the immense Dutch bulb growing industry, it attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors, who flock during late April and early May when the garden is at its most stupendously colourful.

Giverny, Haute Normandie, France

Claude Monet’s inspirational garden is essentially two separate gardens. The Flower Garden is designed around the Grand Allee leading to the house and is a seasonally changing tapestry of colour that stretches from the ground into the sky via trellises and archways. On the other side of the railroad is the Water Garden, inspired by the landscapes of Japanese prints, and now an icon of garden design, with wisteria dripping over curved bridges, and waterlilies floating serenely on lazily drifting reflections in the lake.

Sissinghurst, Kent, England

The most imitated part of English poet and novelist, Vita Sackville-West’s widely admired garden is the White Garden, which dominated much of 1980s garden design, but there is much more to Sissinghurst than this. The success of the garden is the partnership between the architectural hedging of Sackville-West’s lover, Harold Nicholson, and her own exuberant colouring in with flowers and foliage. The garden works as a series of rooms, each with a different focus or mood. Like the all-white garden, it’s an idea much copied throughout the 20th century.

Hidcote,Gloucestershire, England

The idea of the garden room bordered by an eye-catching combination of plants was pioneered here by American-born British soldier and garden creator, Lawrence Johnston, who moved to Hidcote in 1907. The red borders, which date from 1913 are said to be the first single-coloured borders in England, and they glow with heart-stopping intensity in the soft light, especially when contrasted against the emerald green of the lawns and evergreens.

Villa D’Este, Lazio, Italy

Some enterprising film producrer should stage a new production of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream at Villa D’este, for the garden is already full of magic and strange happenings. A series of terraces and intersecting paths demand the visitor explore. When the garden was first finished in the late 16th century, visitors were also actors on the garden’s play, setting off the elaborate water fountains and tricks as they moved through it. The aura of mystery and surprise remains.

Alhambra, Andalucia, Spain

The scrollwork on the arches, and the intricacies of the tiling around the walls, spell out opulence and extravagance, but the garden courtyards of this ancient Moorish palace show an appealingly modern restraint. It’s the simplicity of the planting, combined with the cooling visual and sound effects of water in constrained spaces, that has made the Alhambra one of the most quoted gardens of the last few decades.

Butchart, British Columbia, Canada

You have to admire the vision of Jennie Butchart who saw the potential for beauty in the disused quarry close by the house she shared with her husband, cement baron Robert Butchart. The quarry became a sunken garden, the Butcharts added a Japanese style garden, an Italian garden and a rose garden and their pleasure grounds are now visited by more than a million visitors a year.

Gardens to see before you die

“Entering any great garden always engenders an immediate transformation of reality that invariably produces an enormous sense of relief,” writes Peter Cundall in the preface to 1001 Gardens you must see before you die (ABC Books, $65). In a sentence, he captures what we all love about visiting great gardens, that moment of transformation when our everyday reality melts towards paradise. This doorstop of a book features introductions to many of the world’s greatest gardens, spread from Africa to New Zealand, Russia to Fiji. It’s part guide, part inspiration, part memory-aid, and always a celebration of the creativity, persistence, ingenuity and hard work of gardeners everywhere. If you follow its instruction, you’ll need to start touring ­– now. To see the 1001 gardens featured before you die, you’ll need to visit at least 20 a year for the next 50 years – happy garden touring!