Beautiful Easy Flower Gardens: Step-by-Step and Seasonal Plans for a Colorful, Exciting Landscape [Hardcover]

Laurence Sombke (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The key to truly beautiful and truly easy flower gardens, this book gives detailed season-by-season directions for creating and maintaining colorful, exciting landscapes and special gardens such as picket fence gardens, rock gardens, boggy gardens, and many others.

From Publishers Weekly

The title is not misleading. A radio host and garden designer in the Northeast, Sombke writes in engagingly conversational style and offers practical design suggestions that should prompt even the most garden-wary to try their hands at growing flowers. After a discussion of site planning and such basics as tools and composting (Sombke is a committed organic gardener; "Don't Treat Your Soil Like Dirt" is one chapter heading), the remaining two thirds of the abundantly illustrated book are devoted to a broad selection of garden designs with such tempting names as Peek-Through Picket Fence Flowers, Shady Woodland Wildflower Garden and An El Diablo Drought-Tolerant Garden. The designs contain complete information about what aspiring gardeners can expect from each of the plants and a four-season "chore" list outlining what is involved in caring for the new garden. Although there are certainly ideas here for the experienced gardener, the book is an excellent choice for the beginner.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 282 pages
• Publisher: Rodale Press (October 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0875967000
• ISBN-13: 978-0875967004
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,185,565 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful Easy Flower Gardens, April 28, 2003

By 

Valerie Adolph "Coast Journal" (Pacific Northwest) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Beautiful Easy Flower Gardens: Step-by-Step and Seasonal Plans for a Colorful, Exciting Landscape (Hardcover)

This host of "the Natural Garden" on Northeast Public Radio has developed a low-maintenance approach to gardening that allows him to have a beautiful garden with interesting plants - and time for his family too.

This easy-to-read book starts with the very basics of gardening - the site, the soil and the tools a new gardener will need and then guides the reader in developing gardens for a wide range of sites. He explains how to design a garden, choose annuals and perennials for the site and each season, and then how to maintain that garden through the year. There are good source lists and a useful reference section.

The writer has a direct approach that is readable and useful for the novice gardener. The book is published by Rodale - a long-established and reliable publisher of gardening books.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just Like On the Radio, April 13, 2000

By 

Henry Sapoznik (Olivebridge, NY United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beautiful Easy Flower Gardens: Step-by-Step and Seasonal Plans for a Colorful, Exciting Landscape (Hardcover)

As a longtime fan of Larry Sombke's occasional stint on WAMC's "Vox Pop" program, I was thrilled to find out about his books. Just like his radio self, Sombke's prose is smooth with clear explanations and illustrations accessible even to those of us with purple thumbs...