The Art of Planting

This book by the late Rosemary Verey is stunning and most inspirational. The plantings and pictures are gorgeous. The concepts of color contrast and harmony--painting with color-- are worked into the text and captions, with the detailed botanical and cultivar names fully cited. The only great problem is that these are English gardens, adapted to a moist and cloudy regime that rarely exists in America with its climate extremes and strong seasonality--as ex-patriate Thalassa Cruso (Making Things Grow) discovered years ago. You won't get the green lawns and misty colors shown everywhere here, and you'll need another source book to check for USDA hardiness zone or cultivation information. While Verey has visited North American gardens she has little to say about them. Nevertheless, Verey's concepts of seasonal associations of disparate yet harmonized plants are spot on. The picture captions are highly informative alone, and the extensive text is like a personal journey, including which English garden first inspired which idea. (She published other books that contain the garden plans, especially for her own estate at Barnsley Hall.) I found her ideas to have late climbing plants emerge through early blooming shrubs most interesting. This is a lovely, large, and inspiring book of color photographs and concepts.

If I had to give up all of my scores of gardening books but one, this would be the one I'd keep!!Rosemary Verey is a master of gardening and her ability to create exceptional combinations of plants is unsurpassed. This is what she does in this book. She combines plants - annuals, perennials, shrubs, trees - into groups of exceptional beauty. You can find a color combination that delights you visually. If you actually plant her combination you can also have fragrance, four season interest, and solutions to problem sites. Her combinations - and the photographs of her plantings - are so satisfying to peruse all year round. You'll be motivated and can have the most exciting garden ever!

Rosemary Verey is the doyenne of English gardeners and as such can teach any gardener something. Although American gardeners must proceed cautiously when trying to replicate English garden ideas--owing to differing moisture conditions, the chalk base under British beds, and latitude/longitude considerations, i.e. the effects of the sun--THE ART OF PLANTING contains much to recommend it. For example, Verey shows us Mrs Pugh's bog garden at Docton Mill in Devon. Devon has a climate comparable to Zones 7 & 8 in the U.S. but the sun does not get nearly as hot in the summer months in Devon as it does in most Zone 7 & 8 U.S. areas. Devon is further north and it is warmed by the Gulf Stream like New England. Mrs. Pugh grows Iris, ferns and Hosta lillies in her garden. Her ferns include the osrich plume fern 'Osmunda Regalis' which grows wild in the eastern U.S.--I have found them in drainage ditches but you can buy them at a good nursery. Mrs. Pugh also grows Iris pallida. I have been able to grow a similar plant in Virginia--Iris siberica which requires both dampness and sun. Most Hosta lillies would not last in the same garden as the Iris or the fern, however. Hostas mostly prefer shade like the ferns, but they also like dry conditions. In fact, they are a mainstay in my shade gardens. If you try to replicate Mrs. Pugh's garden, you may have to improvise with plants that like both the U.S. sun and dampness. In addition to the wide array of growing conditions, Verey discusses the use of color, shape and texture in planting. She says, "Some plants need shining leaves to set them off, particularly...white flowers with green centers. Other, like potentillas merge with their foliage." In other words, consider not only the juxtapostion of flower color and size but the neighborliness of leaves. In one photo shows the iceberg rose 'Schneewitchen' growing in a bed of 'Stachys' or lamb's ears. The glossy green leaves of the rose contrast nicely with the soft green fuzzy leaves of the Stachys and the large white flowers of the rose blend beautifully with the contrasting green leaves.There are several sets of photos and text discussing the use of monochromatic color schemes. The most famous example of the white scheme is the White Garden at Sissinghurst, but Verey shows the reader Anne Dexter's tiny Oxford garden where a white hydrangea stands next to a hidden door. Another monochromatic scheme might be purple, using Campanula persicifolia and Stachys byzantina, and blue pansies and hyacinths. The U.S. gardener might not be able to copy the designs Verey shows exactly because blooming times for plants vary from place to place. Verey's color schemes could be executed with local plants, however. The easiest way to discover what might work is to take a trip to the local nursery and pick out plants blooming close to the same time. Ask the nursery staff if the plants came from a hothouse, because sometimes plants bloom out of season owing to sheltered conditio

Crisp, clear photography. A masterful guide to companion plants --you'll want to recreate them in your own garden. Drawing from her years of experience and knowledge of gardens of the world Rosemary Verrey shows you in narrative photographs how to create color palletes that are soothing to the senses. Even those photographs of brightly colored combinations avoid the glaring and garish look of some boldly colored gardens. Multiple photographs of similar plant combinations make it easy to create the look that you want and still exercise your own creativity. Includes beds of mixed borders, bulbs, woodland, ground covers, and damp/ boggy sites.Worth buying for the photography alone.