Favorite Cottage Garden Books

I was reading the thread from last November on favorite CG books and thought I'd start a new one.

Seeing that our gardening "down time" is fast upon us, I thought I'd suggest my all-time favorite read: An Island Garden by Celia Thaxter. For those of you not familiar with this classic, Celia's family had a house on a rocky island off the New Hampshire shore. This book details her yearly seaside cottage garden, with a layout and list of every flower she puts in it - I salivate when I read this book, and I try to read it yearly!

I like old books and another good winter read is Old Time Gardens by Alice Morse Earle - it was originally published in 1901 and "was one of the most popular and influential garden books of the early 20th century". I think I got mine from Amazon.

Even though written for children, a delightful read is The Mary Frances Garden Book (Adventures Among the Garden People) by Jane Eayre Fryer. It's a hardcover storybook with great (1916) illustrations about Victorian-era siblings who want to start their own garden. Apparently the author wanted to teach children how to garden without them knowing they were being educated! I might have purchased it from Chinaberry, but I'm sure it can be Google-ed easily.

From my top five favorite books I have to mention The Potting Shed by Smith & Hawken. What's a cottage garden without a potting shed? Wonderful photos!

Happy reading!
Sue

Hey, thanks for starting this thread, Sue. I'm sure that I'll be coming back to review the suggested titles this Winter.

I just pulled a few books off of the shelf that I often look to for inspiration in my CG, but I'll add more later. I picked up each of these during trips to England, so some of them have more of a British slant to them:

"Cottage Gardens - Practical Advice on Designing and Creating Cottage Gardens", Robert Sulzberger - very small paperback, but packed full of great information and color photos

"The Herb Bible - A visual directory of all the most popular and easy-to-grow herbs * Planting, growing, harvesting, and preserving hints * Herbs in the home * How to get the most out of the herbs you grow", Peter McHoy and Pamela Westland

"Gardening with Herbs", Emelie Tolley and Chris Mead

"The Ultimate Garden Designer", Tim Newbury - I love that this one includes complete gardens with detailed drawings and plant lists for a number of different types of gardens. In the Cottage Garden chapter alone, it includes designs for a Traditional CG, a Contemporary CG, and a Small Town CG. Some other chapters include Kitchen Gardens, Plant Enthusiasts Gardens, Gardens for the Disabled, Formal Gardens, etc. etc.


I wanted to add that the herb books are in my list because herbs are an integral part of cottage gardening...



This message was edited Sep 18, 2007 11:58 PM

Oh good, a new books list with lots of wonderful things to look up in preparation for winter. PrimroseSue, our book collections must overlap. I have both the Island Garden and the Mary Frances Garden Book. You might like "Children and Gardens" by Gertrude Jekyll if you don't already own it. It lays out her 1st garden and how much pleasure it afforded her with lots of early 1900 B&W photos of plants, structures, pets and children in the garden.
wrightie,
Besides the herbs I also like the combination of vegetables and flowers in the cottage garden. A wonderful book on flowers and vegetables is "Creative Vegetable Gardening Accenting Your Vegetables with Flowers" by Joy Larkcom.

Thanks, Semper - I'll look for it!

Semper, I'm not 'into' children's books, but as I mentioned, I like older ones. I can't believe I let Gert's book slip by me! But I just ordered it from Amazon, so I'm good!

And, Wrightie, I ordered The Ultimate Garden Designer's book, also.

I never use ideas from gardening books - I just like looking at the pictures. In my gardens, I just shove things here, and switch them around there - my yard's a jumble! . . . maybe I should start using the books' advice!

PS, I haven't used the plant lists or specific designs from my books, but I have taken elements of many of them.

I'm looking at my garden, after my worst gardening year on record, and I'm seriously considering ripping everything (I use that term loosely) next Spring and re-vamping the whole thing. Maybe I'll follow someone else's design the next time around. I do hope that you like the book (fingers crossed).

i have alot of vintage garden books....i love them...their look their feel ....; one childrens book i find very lovely....done in 1910 ....'flower children' by gordon; the book is just precious....she does a series and another i have is 'wild flower children' ....

http://cgi.ebay.com/ANTIQUE-BOOK-FLOWER-CHILDREN-BY-ELIZABETH-GORDON-1910_W0QQitemZ280154684885QQihZ018QQcategoryZ279QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.com/1918-WILD-FLOWER-CHILDREN-FAIRIES-ORIG-VOLLAND-NICE_W0QQitemZ140157790215QQihZ004QQcategoryZ29223QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

the final one i will post is called flower book for children by burgess....it is lovely to look at on the outside.....
http://cgi.ebay.com/Flower-Book-for-Children-1923-Thornton-Burgess-Color_W0QQitemZ320159563449QQihZ011QQcategoryZ29223QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

will post more when i get a chance

Ah, sticks, it's not nice to tempt me with books with charming period illustrations. Or potting sheds Primrose, I desperately need one of those. And wrightie, the cottage garden and design books also look interesting.
Does anyone have a good recommendation for a cottage type designing book that uses native plants? I have one that is really good ( but not exactly cottage design, but can be adapted) called "Wildflowers in your garden A Gardeners Guide" by Viki Ferreniea- the plant selections would be most suitable for the Northeast.

wrightie, what happened to your garden? I hope it wasn't a severe loss. On a lighter note, isn't it normal to rip out and revamp whole sections of the garden? LOL

I used several large pots of colorful herbs throughout the garden this year and was happy with the long lasting display of color, texture and fragrance. So when I found a new book on container plants in the library called "Pots in the Garden expert design and planting techniques" by Ray Rogers, published by Timber Press, I was inspired by all the possibilities. Nice eye candy.


This message was edited Sep 24, 2007 5:44 PM

Semper, I wish I had a real potting shed, too! I have a tree-house-turned-garden-shed (about 5x6) for storage.
In my house, I have a "playroom" and I use it for: washer/dryer, computer table, pantry shelves, ebay sales - very modest - I mostly store boxes!, home schooling, and potting/growing! Needless to say, this room is rarely clutter-free!
But "someday", I'll have my dream potting shed/greenhouse with running water, electricity (for a ceiling fan!), a rocking chair, and an old-fashioned dutch door!
Dream on, girls!!!

Oh My. I just received a new book that I ordered and I'm very excited about it - I think I'm going to love it:

"The Cottage Gardener's Companion - A Seasonal Guide to Plants & Plantings for Informal Gardens." It is written by members of the Cottage Garden Society, which I recently joined (see my separate thread on that subject, if this is of interest to you).

PrimroseSue,
A treehouse turned garden shed sounds like fun. My tools are continually getting dumped out in the open and I'm afraid they got wet a number of times this summer. I converted the garage to an art studio(no more space in there) and the little screened gazebo (where they were stored next) was under repair on and off for the last 2 years. The gazebo repair was a barter - I replanted and maintain a small front garden in exchange.

Back to books. My garden club had a wonderful speaker and author last week, Lee Reich. I already owned and enjoyed " A Northeast Gardener's Year" by him and recommend it as both informative and a good read. This talk was on the book "Uncommon Fruits for Every Gardener". We got to sample various fruits like American persimmon, Shipova and PawPaw. I had already included a number of high and low bush blueberries in my garden, for both fruit and ornamental value on the recommendation of the 1st book and have been happy with the result. Of course they are still small bushes at this point.

Semper, the shed could be more fun if it was bigger!

Oops! I was going to throw in the pic, but clicked Send instead of Browse! Here's my shed (again)!

Primrose, I have stone envy. I love that shot.

Wrightie, I don't like to get off subject on threads, but I will this time! In a nutshell, our 200-yr-old farmhouse burned down five years ago (woodstove spark, daytime, all ok except the 2 cats got 'smoked').
My resourceful dh took the foundation stones and made two sets of stairs in the yard! He also did the stonewalls and put them everywhere! He never did stonework before, and didn't even read up on how to do it.
This really surprised me because he's in chemistry and has a very analytical mind - he's not a hands-on person. He considers any kind of yard work a chore. But somehow, I guess he found his "outdoor niche" with rocks.

It's lovely, Primrose.

Wrightie, have you gotten any further into that book? How is it? It sounds like something I might be interested in....

No, sorry. I've been on the road most of the past week. Come over for lunch tomorrow; I'll letcha look at it...

Smartie! You'll be at the expo, anyway...

PrimroseSue.
You can move that little potting shed/ treehouse right over to my house. It's wonderful in that setting. I looked for the potting shed book at Barnes and Noble but the didn't have it. I like to see the books in person sometimes before buying.

I'd recommend all 3 Henry Mitchell gardening books just for the joy of reading a well written knowledgeable account of gardening."On Gardening"
" One Man's Garden"
" The Essential Earthman"
Another delightful read is " A Gentle Plea for Chaos" by Mirabel Osler

It really is getting cold here and I can feel the need to replace my gardening with reading.

wrightie, How did you like The Cottage Gardener's Companion"?

I found a new book, for me anyway, I think it was originally published in '03 , with lots of nice photos. "Front Yard Gardens Growing more then Grass" by Liz Primeau. There were a couple of other titles on the same subject at Barnes and Noble I want to look into. Anyone have a book on this topic they'd like to recommend?

Liz Primeau's book is the best on front yard gardens, in my opinion. I love that book!
Some of my favorite cottage garden books are by Ethne Clarke. I love "Herb Garden Design" and "English Cottage Gardens" (don't be put off by the title, Ethne lives in the USA now and does discuss her own garden).

girlgroupgirl

I really like the Cottage Gardener's Companion! I'll have to come back to post more comments about the book another time though.

GGG, I'm curious about Primeau's book as I'm trying to include as many perennials/herbs out front as possible without it looking too out of control. I'll have to look it up.

Happy Birthday Sue! Hope your having a great one! Rachel

Thanks, Rachel, it was a nice day!

English cottage gardens are the finest in the world....................
Nothing beats sitting in a cottage garden surrounded by beautiful packed borders.

Mark

I just got this book recently - Old-Fashioned Flowers, from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden "21st-Century Gardening Series", guest edited by Tovah Martin. It's a smaller book, about 100 pages, with only seven actual chapters. Each chapter is an "article" on a particular subject by a well-known expert in that field, i.e., "Classic Bulbs" by Scott Kunst of Old House Gardens. I'm really delighted with it - found it on Amazon for about five bucks.