Gardeners need to lift their eyes up from their own patch of ground and explore other gardens. We learn most about garden design and all the possibilities of using plants by seeing what we like and dislike about what others have done. Close observation teaches more than any textbook, and Great American Gardens is packed with full-page photographs to delight the eye and intrigue the mind. A nationwide garden tour is packaged between the covers of this slim, oversized volume. Arranged by section of the country, this book takes the reader through the gardens of New England, the Old South, the plains, and the mountains to the far West. Colonial gardens, hedged and tidy, burst with tulips, pansies, and herbs; classical statuary and clapboard houses, as well as the grandeur of Monticello and Mount Vernon, show both the English and French influences on early American gardens. It moves from the formal and European to the topography-driven gardens and more casual style of the western states. Rock gardens, meadow gardens, and cottage styles are fairly recent developments in American garden history; all are displayed here in glowing color, and in context of housing styles and major public gardens.
The final chapter, "Developing an American Style," introduces the influence of Asian gardens, modernism, naturalism, the ecological garden, and environmental concerns that have changed our gardens in the latter part of this century. This book can be enjoyed as an introduction to American gardens, their history and diversity, or simply as a photographic exploration of beautiful garden style. --Valerie Easton
