I read this Fairly new book last month but it takes me a while to get around to things like blogging my reaction to it. It's a very well written, intersting book with enough detail to be able to picture her gardens.
Some of her points are:
Leave some lawn- negative space is important.
Garden "rooms" are successful- walled with hedges.
Herb gardens are not so easy in the northeast, as most herbs like it hot and dry.
Her vegetable garden is very formal- like in a French estate with a columned chicken house at the end of the path looking like a temple or folly.
Meadow gardens require more care than one thought .
Repeated plants in a garden can be very successful, like buttons on a vest(provided not everything is like that).
Doorways ans paths are very important to the overall affect.
We all to combine artistic tendencies with over the top addictive plant collecting.
Ornamental grasses work well with other plants.
Labelling is important.
Don't use too many variegated plants.
A swimming pool can be a wonderful "water feature" if sited in the right way.
Use multi-season plants.
She dug out an entire Japanese barberry hedge.
Use multiple compost piles so you can be using one while others ripen.
Smaller dogs are better with gardens than larger dogs.
Gardens get shadier as they mature.
Switch to more shrubs as you age.
She prefers lots of water spigots and hoses to irrigation systems.
The only quibbles I have with her book (and maybe she put in something that nit-pickers could latch on to on purpose) are that 'Beauty of Moscow' lilac is double and I don't thin Magnolia 'Merrill' is very fragrant.
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