The Crafted Gardenÿis the second book by exceptional new talent, Louise Curley, who shares her passion for natural garden craft with a wider audience. These fifty novel and attractive projects and techniques will give everyone a chance to feel clever about their creativity, as they transform twigs, sprigs, berries and stems into baubles, bunches, decorations and works of art.ÿ These are projects for indoors and out, arranged by the season, with galleries of projects to inspire, step by steps projects to copy and technique masterclasses to help readers develop their own skills. The Crafted Garden is about bringing the outdoors in and being inspired by nature. It's about recapturing the joy of making daisy chains, of nature tables of foraged finds as an antidote to modern life. This book relies on home-grown and foraged plant material to open up the imagination and capture seasonality, whether that's to add a touch of individuality to a dinner party or for making the perfect housewarming gift. Reuse, recycle recreate are the ideas behind each project. LOUISE CURLEYÿhas a growing audience through her widely read blog,ÿhttps://wellywoman.wordpress.comÿand features in Gardeners' World, Grow Your Own, Garden Answers and the Guardian. Her first book, The Cut Flower Patch, has received many plaudits, been translated across Europe, and this second combination of Louise's inspiration and Jason Ingram's photography makes a compelling and giftable package. Crafting projects using garden gatherings is an increasingly popular area of interest, as people extend from grow-your-own to make-your-own. The green credentials of this book, as with The Cut Flower Patch, will be self-evident.

The intimate Monk's Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston embodies the design principles that inform the work of noted landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh. In Designing a Garden, Van Valkenburgh presents the design of the Monk's Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, an intimate, walled garden that Laurie Olin has described as "a masterpiece, and not a minor one." The book documents the evolution of the garden's design, which is based on the concept of meandering paths through a dreamlike woodland to create a contemplative space. Sketches and models show how the idea was worked out, and lush photographs reveal the completed garden through the seasons. Van Valkenburgh's text explores the origins of his love of landscape and plants in his family farm in Upstate New York and how this has influenced his intuitions as a designer. He shares the full background story of the Monk's Garden, focusing on the experimental nature of design work as well as the challenges and satisfactions of the small scale and the historic and cultural context. Designing a Garden provides a unique first-person account of the design process from the most prominent landscape architects in the country.

"Dreaming Gardens is a work that provides, for the first time, a framework for understanding the contributions of landscape architecture in the creation of Israel. The development of the landscape architecture profession in Israel paralleled the development of the state, as immigrants brought skills and ideas from the Diaspora, creating a unique opportunity for designers to help shape their national identity. Helphand's clear writing, complemented by copious color illustrations, charts the shifting attitudes of this singular culture toward its land, landscapes, communities, and nation."--BOOK JACKET.

“I want to put the mystery back into the heart of garden design, where it needs to be. It’s what lures you in through the gate, keeps you moving through the landscape, and fills you with excitement along the way. The sense of mystery is what turns a mere display of plants, paths, and ornaments into an adventure.” —James van Sweden Guided by world-renowned landscape architect James van Sweden and horticulture expert Tom Christopher, any gardener can learn the secrets of the gardener’s art and absorb the essence of inspired garden design. In their gifted hands, creating your own perfect garden, with its own alluring mysteries, turns out to be not only easy but a delight. Whether it’s a ten-foot-square city terrace or a ten-acre expanse, the same principles apply: the intelligent use of positive and negative space, of form and scale, of light and shadow, of rough and smooth textures. Do you want a garden you can immerse yourself in? A garden you can smell and listen to as well as observe? An exuberant garden or a contemplative garden? In this elegantly written and visually stunning book, van Sweden reveals the secrets of famous gardens around the world and encourages you to find inspiration in the arts—in painting (from America’s classic regional artists to the abstract expressionists), music (from classical to jazz), sculpture, even dance. He introduces you to famous artists who share how their art has influenced the design of their own gardens, and teaches you to think not in terms of borders and beds or even paths and meadows but of a tapestry woven from sky, trees, rocks, vines, flowers, grasses, and space. Richly illustrated throughout with magnificent photographs, The Artful Garden both tells and shows, sharing with beginning and experienced gardeners a wealth of inspiration and practical help. “What’s my message?” van Sweden asks in conclusion. The wise answer: “Don’t squander the potential for surprise and wonder.” This beautiful book guarantees everyone who reads it a priceless store of gardening wisdom.

Not since Martha Schinz's masterful Visions of Paradise, published in 1984, has there been such an important survey of garden design and style as Breaking Ground. Whereas Visions of Paradise featured classic European garden design, Breaking Ground takes an in-depth look at the work of ten contemporary garden designers living and working in America and Europe today. The two hundred glorious full-color photographs by Erica Lennard and the lucid text by garden writer and designer Page Dickey capture the spirit and genius of the ten designers. A chapter is devoted to each designer--his or her sources of inspiration, style, philosophy, and method of creation. From the bold Southern California designs of Nancy Power to the urban geometries of Madison Cox to the updated French formal style of Louis Benech to the romantic country gardens of Nancy McCabe, Breaking Ground profiles the artists who are redefining garden design categories. Inspirational, informative, contemporary, and beautiful, Breaking Ground is a spectacularly crafted object in itself--sure to be one of the major garden gift books of the season.

An inspiring guide to transforming a small patch of ground, be it on an allotment or in a garden, into a cut flower patch which produces flowers from early spring to late autumn. Louise Curley looks at what makes a great cut flower, ideal conditions and soil and the tools you’ll need. There is advice on what to grow – from favourite hardy annuals, half hardies and biennials to spring and summer bulbs to adding foliage and fillers to balance arrangements – and advice on how and when to sow, how to support your plants and tips on weeding, deadheading, pests and feeding. Growing your own means greater choice, working with the seasons and super fresh flowers. Bought flowers can be expensive and the international flower trade often means dangerous chemicals, poor working conditions for growers, demands on water resources and the ‘flower miles’ of worldwide airfreight. This book will help you get the most from your patch with guidance on how to cut the flowers so that they keep producing more blooms and how to look after them once they have been picked. The Cut Flower Patch is completed by a selection of flower arranging tips and sample arrangements as well as tips on finding great containers, planting plans and a helpful year planner The Cut Flower Patch won the ‘Best Practical Book’ at the Garden Media Guild Awards, 2014 Jason Ingram won Photographer of the Year at the Garden Media Guild Awards, 2014

This visually magnificent book unveils the alluring world of uncommon botanicals, including a prickly cactus that played a storied role in the founding of an ancient city, a tiny pink mushroom that glows green in the dark, and a magnificent blue cactus with rows of golden spines. Celebrated paper designer Kate Alarcón reveals the rich histories and unique characteristics behind 30 remarkable plants alongside instructions for crafting stunning paper versions of each one. These eye-catching creations make perfect wedding centerpieces, beautiful arrangements (that never wilt!) to brighten a home, and cheerful gifts for any occasion. Brimming with fascinating botanical trivia, vivid photography, and essential design techniques, this is a breathtaking resource for flower lovers, crafters, and anyone fascinated by the mysteries of the natural world.

Nelson Byrd Woltz's award-winning landscape architecture is widely celebrated for combining sheer beauty with ecologically regenerative design. The firm's innovative and highly collaborative design methods bring depleted ecosystems back to life—restoring meadows, streams, woodlands, and ponds in urban and rural settings and cultivating connections between sites and their complex regional environments. Nelson Byrd Woltz: Garden, Park, Community, Farm presents a selection of twelve built projects representing the firm's contemporary vision for sustainable design. These examples demonstrate the remarkable breadth of their practice and inspire a new understanding of how landscape architecture can shape our world through urbanism, agriculture, and conservation sciences. The projects range from an urban townhouse garden to an animal-friendly habitat for the National Zoo's giant pandas to a large-scale sheep-and-cattle station along the coast of New Zealand. Exceptional photography, hand-drawn plans, and lists of plants and materials document each project, and an appendix of details from numerous additional designs provides an extensive visual reference guide. Nelson Byrd Woltz's transformative landscapes are both an open invitation to learn about nature and a much-needed contribution to the health of our cities, farms, and wildlands.

The author traces the rise of the picturesque garden in England and throughout Europe, exploring intricate dialogues between practical place-making and the theoretical formulations of the picturesque. He surveys a wide range of sites - Rousham, Stourhead, Kew, Hestercombe, The Leasowes, Hafod, Ermenonville, Désert de Retz among others - and the contributions to their creation by both amateurs and professionals. The impact on European countries of the English example was complicated by the parallel rise of a picturesque garden in France, which had its own cultural direction even while it looked to England and China for inspiration. Finally, the book analyses and assesses the impact of English and French design upon other countries, in particular Sweden, the German-speaking lands and Russia.

A guide to growing beautiful gardens in drought-prone areas utilizing minimal water for maximum results. With climate change, water rationing, and drought on the rise, water conservation is more important than ever—but that doesn’t mean your gardening options are limited to cacti and rocks. The Water-Saving Garden provides gardeners and homeowners with a diverse array of techniques and plentiful inspiration for creating sustainable gardens that are so beautiful and inviting, it’s hard to believe they are water-thrifty. Including a directory of 100 plants appropriate for a variety of drought-prone regions of the country, this accessible and contemporary xeriscaping guide is full of must-know information on popular gardening topics like native and drought-tolerant plants (including succulents), rainwater harvesting, greywater systems, permeable paving, and more.