Customer Reviews

The Authentic Garden: Five Principles for Cultivating A Sense of Place

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a wonderful book, and an important one, I think. It explains why some gardens touch us and how that sense of wonder is achieved in compelling gardens and maybe even in our own. It does not tell us what plants to plant or how deep to dig or what amendments to add to our soil. For me, it was a light bulb going on. Oh, so that's why I loved this or that on a garden visit! So that's why one thing or another seemed out of place or discordant. As the author describes and illustrates her five principles, it becomes clear what belongs in a garden and what doesn't and why it doesn't. She explains something about regional differences and indigenous materials and why some things just seem to fit in certain places. An additional bonus for me was that, as a resident of southeastern Pennsylvania, several of the public gardens and aboretums she uses as examples are familiar to me and allowed me to look beyond the photographs and into my own memory of the places she describes. The photos are, I should add, extremely well chosen and well placed within the text to illustrate her points. I have to admit that I borrowed this book from the library, but now I know I need to have it for my own.

This is a nice book. The five "principles" are smart and sensible (if not brilliantly original), the photos are apt and attractive and the writing is clear (if humorless). But in illustrating each of her principles the author resorts to the approach taken by so many other gardening books -- an interesting driveway here, a creative clothesline there. And the tone is often annoyingly cranky, picking on current whipping boys like green meatballs and chain-store-bought marigolds. And one could nitpick. The author counsels the use of natives two pages after a lovely photograph of the Scott Arboretum (of which she's the director) that features an interesting assemblage of phormiums, elephant ears and other exotics. In one of her examples of using humble materials - the pebble garden at Dumbarton Oaks - she notes that that great estate was designed by Beatrix Farrand but fails to mention that Farrand didn't design the pebble garden and probably hated it. And dwelling on the two Taliesins and Fallingwater to explain how to figure out the "genius loci" of the reader's half acre suburban plot just isn't helpful. The book just doesn't seem to me to merit all those "five star" reviews. It certainly won't change my gardening life the way, say, Julie Moir Messervy's "The Inward Garden" did.

Review at www.gardendesignonline.com

Claire Sawyers has been involved with plants and gardens for most of her life, and now, the director of the Scott Arboretum at Swarthmore College is pushing the development of a true American garden style.

In her new book, The Authentic Garden: Five Principles for Cultivating A Sense of Place (Timber Press, 2008), Sawyers says "we come up short when we try to identify the essence of the American garden." She believes that's perhaps because we haven't been making gardens long enough, or because we're still trying to define the American garden ethic.

Sawyers urges all Americans to abandon what so many in this country like to do: install English or Italian or Japanese or Persian or whatever-else gardens in our unique United States landscapes.

In the book, she outlines a five-step process to make our gardens authentically American, and scores of photos throughout the book illustrate each of her principles beautifully. She advises everyone to work with their own particular landscape, rather than struggling against it -- i.e., take your design cues from the natural rock outcroppings, open fields or natural forests already in place -- don't raze them in favor of formal terraces. This, Sawyers calls capturing "a sense of place."

Next, she says designers should "derive beauty from function." Working with natural materials, she believes, enhances the American landscape: using natural stones for fences and walls in New England, adobe in the Southwest, and split-rail fencing in the hills of Virginia. Sawyers advocates designing pools and spas that are integrated into the landscape design so that they "don't look like a giant Caribbean tub dropped into the garden."

Finally, she calls for the use of "humble materials," making sure that you "marry the inside to the outside," and "involve the visitor" in the garden experience. "Even on a small urban lot," says Sawyers, "garden paths can direct and encourage a visitor's experience and create a sense of journey."

At the end of the book, Sawyers writes about several residential and public gardens that capture the spirit of a true "American garden," and she demonstrates how each one includes the five principles she outlines in the book. Among them area the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, Texas and the Brandywine Conservancy River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania.

Sawyers is not writing about some kind of design style that's one-size fits all for American landscapes like the "New American Garden" developed by James van Sweden and Wolfgang Oehme, with wide swathes of ornamental grasses, shrubs and perennials. The "American" garden that Sawyers envisions would be different in every region of the United States, yet have singular qualities that everyone could recognize as truly "American."

If you're tired of English cottage gardens, Asian-style gardens and formal landscapes, as I often am, this is the book for you. It'll inspire you to think about how to create a landscape that's not only original, but one that will last through the American ages.

Everybody recognizes and appreciates a beautiful landscape when they see it, but not many can tell you why the landscape is so aesthetically appealing. Claire Sawyers' book, The Authentic Garden: Five Principles for Cultivating a Sense of Place, answers that question in clear understandable terms.

Whether you have a small yard surrounding a townhouse, as I do, or extensive property, the principles Claire discusses apply equally well. Written in a clear, concise and non-technical fashion, and illustrated with numerous well-chosen photographs, Claire's book speaks to the entire range of gardeners from "keen plantsmen" and "serious gardeners" to those of us who just want our yard to "look good." This is not a book about selecting the perfect plants; it is about how to integrate your entire landscape into a coherent whole that is beautiful, satisfying and yours--your house, your yard, your plants, your mailbox, your garden shed, your driveway, your neighborhood.

Each of the chapters that discuss the five principles is enlightening and educational. One of best things about the book is the final chapter in which Claire brings all of her principles together in her description of three very different, but equally lovely, landscapes. Whether you are new to gardening and landscape design or an experienced serious gardener, you'll learn something new and valuable in this book.

I had seen the author, Claire E. Sawyers, at this year's Seattle Garden Show and was very impressed with her presentation. The five principles will forever alter the way I think about elements of landscape design."Authentic" is a very appropriate word to describe her ideas, for you are considering your unique situation, not trying to replicate an Asian or European flavor. And I liked the notion of using a more basic material, if it works, rather than a more expensive material, just because it is expensive. I will not be placing this book in a garage sale; it is in my permanent library.

This is one of the best gardening books there is. It's not a how to book, but more about gardening philosophy. It will really change the way you think about gardening and really help you make the most of the space and environment you've been given. It also has great photographs to really help you get inspired in the garden! I actually give them to friends as gifts particularly if they seem to be at a loss about their own garden or have particularly gardening challenges.