Seafield Gardens is a peaceful, well-maintained park in Southbourne, set just back from the clifftop and beaches on the eastern side of Bournemouth. It functions as a working local park rather than a tourist draw, the kind of place residents visit to bowl, play tennis, walk the dog or let children loose in the play area, though its history and Grade II listed water tower make it worth a detour for anyone exploring Southbourne.
From turf common to formal park
The gardens started life as common land where locals cut turf for fuel, until Bournemouth Council bought the site in 1906. A pavilion was added in 1911, and by 1929 the grounds had been laid out as a formal park, eventually expanding to two bowling greens and fourteen tennis courts by 1936, a scale that reflects how much Edwardian and interwar Bournemouth invested in its parks. Some of those courts were later converted to hard surfaces alongside a children's playground in 1956, shaping the mix of facilities still found there today.
The water tower and the Five Parks
The park's defining feature is its water tower, built in 1898 to supply drinking water to Southbourne-on-sea after the pumping station at Iford failed. It's privately owned but carries a Grade II listing, and remains visible above the treeline. Alongside Kings Park and Redhill Common, Seafield Gardens is held in trust under The Five Parks, Bournemouth charity, one of five green spaces set aside for public recreation over a century ago and still free to enter today.
There's no on-site car park, so visitors arrive on foot via Seafield Road, Guildhall Road, Tuckton Road or Ken Road. Discover more of the area in our guide to things to do in Bournemouth.
