Villa Taranto, Pallanza

A Scotsman, Neil McEacharn, bought the estate at Pallanza in 1931 and spent thirty years planting it with everything he could ship in from Asia and the Americas. The result is roughly twenty hectares of botanic garden on a slope, laid out with formal beds at the top and woodland paths falling towards the water.

For photography it is the most controlled ground on the lake. Avenues of clipped hedge, straight water stairs, a terraced parterre and dense tree cover mean you can move from wide formal frames to close, green, shaded ones in the same ten minutes — and unlike the islands, there is room to stand back.

The calendar matters more here than the clock: tulips through April, azaleas and rhododendrons in May, lotus in the pools in high summer, and the dahlia beds at their peak from late August into September. Under the big trees the light is soft all day, so an overcast sky is not a problem.

The garden is reached by boat from Stresa in about twenty minutes or by road round the head of the gulf, charges admission, and closes for the winter — check the season's opening dates before planning around it.