In article ,
Janet wrote:
In article ,
says...

After many years with a small garden I now have a very large blank
canvas to keep me occupied. At the moment, its featureless. Can anyone
suggest a good book on Garden Design.

Most garden design writers have personal ideas and tastes on what
makes a good garden, which leave a recognisable stamp on every garden
they make (even for other people) and their books usually reflect that.
Without any hint of what you might need/like/reject in your garden plan
it's impossible to guess which designer's books might appeal to you.

What always annoys me is the monomania and relentless positivity
of so much of modern 'information' - and not just in this area.
I fairly often get criticised for spending more time on what may
go wrong and how to avoid that in my IT courses than in telling
people what to do. But people who have real problems to solve
often thank me for it! This is an example. What is most often
wanted is:

What options are possible
What plausible options will NOT work
What problems may arise if you do X
What to check for whether X is feasible

And so on. To take one simple and common example, there are a
lot of plants that need no pruning. What you need to know is
whether they will eventually get out of hand in a small garden
and, if so, whether they can be cut back hard. It can be damn
hard to find out - e.g. for the clematis or honeysuckles, all
of which have some that can be cut back hard and some that can't.

Another one is Abies koreana - a lovely tree, that grows at c. 6"
a year. It CAN have its lower branches removed to reduce its
dominance widthwise but, when it gets too high/big, all that can
be done is to grub it up. How many books say that?


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.