No comments about Landscape Design: Theory and Application.

No comments about Guide to Site and Environmental Planning.

5 comments about The Garden Book (Mini Edition).

1. If you go to Phaidon's website, this book can be purchased for $9.95 plus shipping/handling. It's half as much to buy from them than through Amazon! I'm surprised, as Amazon usually has the best deals. Shame, shame.
   
   So, don't spend $21 on a book that should only cost you $10!!!



2. This is a gigantic and beautiful book, and I disagree with those who find no inspiration for the small home garden in these pages.
   
   Each incredible location receives only one photograph, and at first I wanted to see more of each garden. But as I turned the pages I began to enjoy the sheer creativity and incredible variety on each page.
   
   The photos are gorgeous and the text is intelligent.
   
   True, I can't replicate these gardens with my space and money, but I find inspiration here and can improvise and scale it to size. I have learned a great deal about the greatest gardens in the history of the world, some of which are now reduced to ruin or exist only in historical record.



3. THIS BOOK SURVEYS ELABORATE GARDENS FROM OVER THE WORLD AND THOSE FOR PARTICULAR ARCHITECTURAL SETINGS. I THINK IT ASSUMES MORE THAN A FAIR AMOUNT OF GARDENING KNNOWLEDGE ON THE PART OF THE READER. SEE A DIFFERENT APPROACH Zen of Watering Your Garden



4. This book was recommended by a Landscape Architect. There was not one garden in there for the home, unless, that is, you have a multi-million dollar estate and more than 3 acres. What a waste of money for the home gardener.



5. My heavens, what a lovely book! Although my creative cathexis is primarily focused on product design and architecture, mine eyes have beheld the glory of landscape architecture as a result of this inspiring tome (as well as the fascinating biannual of modern landscaping "'Scape," which is also available on Amazon). The pictures are lush, even in a little book like this. The alphabetical organization mixes thousands of years of masterpieces from around the world, giving a fabulous feel for the astounding diversity and creativity of landscaping. And the price simply can't be beat. I can't recommend this book highly enough -- I'd give it 10 stars if I could!

No comments about Town and Square: From the Agora to the Village Green.

No comments about Gardens and Gardening in the Chesapeake, 1700-1805.

1 comments about Nature's Design: A Practical Guide to Natural Landscaping.

1. From the very dawn of what we laughingly refer to as civilization, when knuckle-dragging Neanderthals gawked as ferns unfurled their fronds and begged the sun to pour its magic warmth upon them, dandelions (back then referred to as "dent-de-saber-tooth-tigers) exploded, and aquifer recharge areas gurgled far below unshod, hairy feet, mankind has regarded nature as a malleable source of inspiration easily bent to aesthetically pleasurable forms, as well as a walk-through self-service convenience store that miraculously restocks itself without the help of Pakistani clerks. No one knows this better than Ms. Smyser, the author of Nature's Design.
   
   At 1 cent, this content-rich tome is attractively priced and bound to add panache, esprit, and insouciance to even the most well-appointed library. Certainly there are those who will take issue with Ms. Smyser's theories concerning rhododendrons, and as to her thoughts on wildflowers, well, one must simply recall the words of Wittgenstein who observed, "Regarding those things we may never understand, let us pass over them in silence." The cool weather crop section, by contrast, is scintillating, passionate, effusive, and scented with just a whiff of je ne c'est quois (whatever that is).
   
   Published in 1982, (24 years ago), by Rodale Press, (located in Emmaus, PA), Nature's Design is 390 pages, (10 shy of 400).

No comments about Walter Hood: Urban Diaries (The Land Marks Series , No 2).

1 comments about A Garden of One's Own: Writings of Elizabeth Lawrence.

1. If you've reached the stage in your garden education where you're a Master Gardener or the self-taught equivalent, you will be ready for "A Garden of One's Own" by Elizabeth Lawrence (1904-85). Ms Lawrence was a landscape architect, botanist, horticulturist, and garden writer who lived and worked in North Carolina. The editors, Scott and Ward have compliled and distilled her writings from many sources (magazines, letters, plant society bulletins) into a useful resource.

   Although "A Garden of One's Own" contains a section dedicated to gardeners in the Middle South as well as a nice essay on William Lanier Hunt, it is not just for those living in the Piedmont area of North Carolina. The book is filled with information Ms Lawrence exchanged with plant collectors and gardeners as far away as the northwest coast of the U.S. Many plants that grow well in the Piedmont area of North Carolina can also be viable futher north, in the upper South, and in various higher altitude areas on the Pacific coast. As Ms Lawrence says, the growing zones extend across the country.

   I have always found Ms Lawrence's exchanges with folks in Ohio (colder), Missippi (hotter), and other parts of the country quite informative. I do believe she must have been one of the first writers to educate the lay public about the effects of climate and growing conditions on garden plants. As every frustrated rosarian knows, one simply cannot grow everything everywhere. Ms Lawrence informed her readers by sharing the thoughts, concerns, and experinces of her correspondants about some plant, say ground phlox, and well as her own thoughts and experiences concerning the same plant.

   Because Ms Lawrence was a botanist, she preferred the Latin names of plants, and always used them in her writing. She included the local coloquial names too -- and on hearing them you understand why the Latin terminology is indespensible. I have find her approach extremely helpful because plants often have dozens of local names, but the Latin identification allows me to know exactly what she's discussing and find it in Hortus. Also, the editors have added footnotes where necessary to update the Latin terminology.

   Ms Lawrence loved 'Rock Gardening' and I found the sections addressing this topic most illiminating. She contrasts the mountainous origins of plants growing on rocks, with the efforts of gardeners in the flatlands to build "mountain-like" gardens. You can build a rock garden anywhere, you just have to think about what you're doing, use flora that will survive in your microcosm, and select plants that will not overtake a bed or dwarf other plants with outsized proportions.

   On a business trip a few years ago, I visited the Denver Botanical Garden--with the goal of viewing the Alpine Rock Gardens. It was April, the sky was blue and the weather unseasonably warm (70 degrees). Lilacs were in bloom along with hundreds of bulbs, but the thing I will remember the longest are the wonderful Alpine rock gardens. I spent the whole day wandering from plot to plot, and don't recall ever having felt any happier. There are little bits of heaven on earth and the Denver Botanical Garden is one of them.

No comments about Earthscape a Manual of Environmental.

No comments about The Figure in the Landscape: Poetry, Painting, and Gardening during the Eighteenth Century.