Frans de Leig

Frans de Leig has an exhibition running at Highdown Gallery from 24 July to 1 August 2027. It's a short run, so if you're planning to see it, you'll want to get there within that week rather than leaving it until the end.

The gallery is part of Highdown Gardens, which is a bit of a hidden gem in Worthing. The gardens were built over 58 years by Sir Frederick Stern, who spent his time collecting rare chalk-tolerant plants from all over the world and bringing them here starting in 1910. He wrote A Chalk Garden and The Study of the genus Peonia (1946), and he was the first to describe the snowdrop species Galanthus rizehensis. The gardens sit in a former chalk quarry in the South Downs National Park and still hold many of the species Stern grew. There's a waterfall too, originally fed by a natural chalk spring, which was brought back to life with an off-grid solar system called 'The Solar Pagoda'.

The gallery itself takes up the visitor centre, so you can walk straight from the art into the gardens. The gardens are open every day of the year and are free to visit, which makes it an easy one to combine with a wander around the grounds. If you're heading over, the exhibition runs from 24 July to 1 August 2027 at Highdown Gallery, Highdown Gardens, Worthing.