A Garden of Fragrance [Hardcover]

Suzy Bales (Author), Suzanne Frutig Bales (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2000

The aromatherapy craze has made clear to millions of Americans what Suzy Bales has always known: that scent, long under-appreciated in our deodorant-obsessed culture, has a vast influence on our moods and well-being. This is especially true in the garden, where the most attention has usually been paid to color, ignoring the vital role that fragrance plays in the drama of a well-designed, appealing, and sensual garden. Finally, here is everything that any gardener -- novice and expert alike -- will need to create such a garden. Organized by the aromatic properties of the plants -- from "The Seductresses" that attract to "The Rogues" that deter -- is expert, detailed advice on how to design, plant, and maintain a garden that's both visually appealing (as the spectacular photographs illustrate) and romantically fragrant.
-- Suzy, Bales was named Garden Writer of the Year by the American Horticultural Society and has received awards from the Garden Writers of America.
-- With over 6 million readers following her columns in Family Circle and American Homestyle and Gardening, Suzy has a large audience eager for tips from their favorite expert.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Medieval gardeners believed that the perfume of flowers was God's breath on earth. Suzy Bales, an unabashed flower lover who tends a large garden on an island off the north shore of Long Island, tells the story of how she has come to treasure scent above all else in the garden. Her evolution as a gardener is told in a readable and entertaining style, along with practical and inspiring suggestions on how to incorporate scented flowers and foliage into the garden.

We think of gardens as being visual, edible, structural, or functional, and too often overlook the olfactory, which is an invisible but powerful factor in our enjoyment of any garden. Our sense of smell is linked to the parts of our brain where moods and emotions are triggered, and where memory is stored. No wonder we so love roses and lilies, and feel nostalgic at the first scent of lilacs. One of fragrance's great charms is its elusiveness. Bales explains that a flower's scent depends on the soil, time of day, temperature, and flower color (most strongly scented flowers are white, but, oddly, most white roses are scentless). Some, such as datura and moonflower, are pollinated by moths, and so release their intoxicating fragrances after the sun sets.

While we tend to regard fragrance as a gift of high summer, each season has its star performers when it comes to scenting the garden. Bales suggests planting witch hazel, sarcococca, and winter honeysuckle, all of which provide fragrance during the coldest and shortest days of the year. Spring brings daphne, lily-of-the-valley, hyacinths, and scented narcissus. In summer there is a surfeit of scents, led by heliotrope, sweet peas, roses, and lilies--and autumn can be perfumed by more than burning leaves with the planting of nicotiana, sweet autumn clematis, and harlequin glorybower. Bales inspires all gardeners to bring this repertoire of fragrance into their own gardens, in every season. --Valerie Easton

About the Author

Suzy Bales is the author of Gifts from the Garden; Ready, Set, Grow; and seven books in the Burpee American Gardening series. She is the contributing garden editor for Family Circle and answers gardening questions monthly for American Homestyle and Gardening. She was named Garden Writer of the Year by the American Horticultural Society. Ahe lives on Long Island in New York.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: ReganBooks; 1St Edition edition (February 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060393416
• ISBN-13: 978-0060393410
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 8.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,619,329 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Suzy Bales has turned her lifelong passion for gardening and cooking into a career.
From 1987 until 1995, she was on the board of the W. Atlee Burpee & Company, overseeing new products and updating their catalog. She had her own weekly gardening column in Newsday for two years before joining Family Circle as their contributing garden editor for twelve years. She wrote for The New York Times for a year before joining Better Homes & Gardens as the Senior Editor for Gardening and Outdoor Living from 2004 until early 2007. She has been featured in Ladies Home Journal, House Beautiful, Better Homes & Gardens, Horticulture, Beautiful Gardens, and Easy Gardening.

Suzy is the author of 14 books. The first eight books were in the Burpee American Gardening Series: Bulbs, Perennials, Annuals, Vegetables, Container Gardening, Roses and Vines, and Ready, Set, Grow, a book on children's gardening. She has also written:
Gifts from Your Garden (Prentice Hall, 1992)
A Garden of Fragrance (Harper Collins, 2000)
Garden Parties (Clarkson Potter, 2003)
The Down-To-Earth Gardner (Rodale, 2004)
The Garden in Winter (Rodale 2007)
Garden Bouquets and Beyond (Rodale 2010)

Suzy won the Garden Writer of the Year Award from the American Horticultural Society in1995, and has twice been awarded the Quill and Trowel Award by The Garden Writers of America. In 2007 she received the Elizabeth Hamilton Great American Philanthropist award for her twenty-five years of volunteer work with abused and homeless children. In 2009 she is receiving an award from the New York Horticultural Society and being honored by Old Westbury Gardens for her garden writing.

Many gardeners and cooks recognize Suzy from her frequent TV appearances on ABC and NBC as well as her series of garden spots on Good Morning America. She travels and lectures constantly and has been the featured speaker at Epcot, the Williamsburg Garden Symposium and other flower shows across the country, including Philadelphia, Seattle, San Francisco, Boston, St. Lewis and Atlanta. Suzy has twice been a featured speaker at the Disney Institute and was a judge and the headline speaker at the Northwest Garden Show in February 2004.

Suzy served on the boards of Hostra University, The American Horticultural Society and the Garden Conservancy and was a distinguished advisor to The Brooklyn Botanic Garden and Old Westbury Gardens. Don't be surprised to find her magnificent six-acre garden on Long Island featured in national magazines and books.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Fragrant Journey, March 30, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: A Garden of Fragrance (Hardcover)

When expert gardener Suzy Bales claims that you'll discover a whole new gardening world by just following your nose, you will. This is a charming book, filled with the author's own memories of her favorite fragrances such as lilacs and peonies and how one can design a garden built around the scents they love. She covers everything from planting to care to which plants work best in combination with the scented blooms you're working with. Bales also demonstrates how to bring the aroma of the garden indoors with imaginative ways to use cuttings from the garden in containers, sachets, even an easy way to force hyacinth bulbs with minimum fuss.

For anyone with a nose that knows, this book is truly a treasure.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Nose Knows, March 31, 2000

By 

Jonna M. Gallo (United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Garden of Fragrance (Hardcover)

Anyone who has ever leaned into a bouquet of flowers and inhaled or strolled in a garden breathing deeply will appreciate this beautiful book. Bales offers novice and veteran gardeners alike a comprehensive volume on how to design, plant and maintain an aromatic oasis sure to delight the sense of smell year-round. Included is detailed information about roses, lilacs, peonies, jasmine, magnolias and much more. Planning to exercise your green thumb this summer? Then check out Bales' book.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great planting begins with great planning!, July 22, 2001

By 

Nina Immers "[e-mail]" (Genoa, Nevada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Garden of Fragrance (Hardcover)

Wonderful thought pattern- not many pictures, and no scratch an sniff- but the information covered is great!

You can plan your fragrances by the time of day you will spend most of your time in the garden- Also by the distance you will be from the plantings...

I would not want to part with this one!