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Great Gardens of America

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Great Gardens of America
By Tim Richardson
Frances Lincoln Ltd
ISBN 9780-7112-2886-3

Thank you Frances Lincoln Ltd for giving us a publication that allows us to visit some of the great gardens of North America, without having to leave home. This book surveys garden estates and private parks in practically every climate zone in the U.S. and Canada. Twenty five gardens with 300 brilliant photographs are included. For each garden surveyed, the author, Tim Richardson, provides an interesting combination of historical and architectural background that helps to identify the landowner's personal contribution to the garden design.

This is a remarkable publication in that it defines the uniqueness of North American gardens in contrast to their European counterparts. What makes them different is the American appreciation for wide vistas as opposed to object or building focused gardens in Europe. In addition, there is a markedly different attitude towards wilderness. The British gardens were intent on keeping out bandits and wild animals. In North America, there is a frontier mentality of living in harmony with nature. Consequently, we see how uniquely American gardens include distant vistas into their design by framing these perspectives with trees and shrubs planted in the foreground. As well, by living in harmony with nature and allowing pastureland to creep up to the front door of the home, the "cult of the American lawn" was developed.

The gardens surveyed in this book range from Jefferson's 18th century Montecello, to an early 20th century Rockefeller estate Kykuit, through modernist gardens commissioned by bold patrons, up to the conceptual curated gardens in Metis Quebec and Sonoma California. The most controversial of them all is the Lurie Garden in Chicago Illinois designed by Piet Oudolf. Here the armchair traveler is given an opportunity to evaluate the results of a garden conceived in the "New Perennial Style".

Some of the more interesting details revealed in this book include the fact that at Kykuit, the largest gardens surveyed, modern sculptures were brilliantly incorporated into a turn-of-the- century garden. We also discover that Viscaya is the closest copy of an Italianate garden in America. The enchanting garden rooms at Dumbarton Oaks demonstrate how one is able to beautifully landscape a property on an ugly slope. This garden offers a sense of perpetual movement that has been captured so insightfully by the book's photographer Andrea Jones.

Special mention also needs to be made of Windcliff in Seattle Washington as "one of the most horticulturaly dynamic private gardens of our times". Here Dan Hinkley's design includes an interplay of color and texture that is rarely seen on properties of this size. The accompanying photos on pages 74 and 75 are such a powerful inspiration to garden designers that they alone should easily justify the purchase of this book. This publication should be a prime candidate for the best garden book of the year.

Allan Becker reviews books on gardening for[...]

There is no characteristic style of great gardens of America; as there is for great gardens of England or Italy for example. The wide geographical and climatic range of the United States and Canada and the diversity of influences on the cultures are reflected in the gardens giving them a greater diversity than any other country. The diverse cultural and aesthetic backgrounds of the landscape designers accounts for this too.

More so than other countries, the great gardens of America incorporate and sometimes represent the vegetation and atmosphere of their locations (rather than aim to create sanctuaries distinct from their surroundings). In most cases, the location is the source for the idea or inspiration of the garden.
A location on Long Island for instance lent itself to a house overlooking a pond resembling the famous Shinto shrine at Ise in Japan. The gardens around this house expand on the Japanese reference with their ponds, antiquities, and sculpture seen in Japanese gardens.

This attunement with specifics and moods of the natural world notable in Japanese landscape and garden design is seen too in most of the other gardens. Lurie Park in the city of Chicago carries this approach to an exceptionally imaginative point. This park crisscrossed by walkways is like a patch of original prairie with its wildflowers, grasses, and other vegetation.

Quebec to the American Southwest, the American Northwest to Miami is the territorial range of the gardens. Within this range come gardens in California, New York, Midwestern states, and others. Each of the 25 gardens is viewed in an individual section with an engaging and informative play of words and photographs. The text of the writer Richardson rests of his background as a garden historian and landscape architecture critic. The text brings out the general and particular features of each garden by relating the origins of the design, historical points, and biographical and stylistic matters about the property owner and the landscape designer.

Jones' 300 color photographs of varying sizes and perspectives (wide-scale to close-up) work in coordination with the text. Jones is the 2008 Royal Horticulture Society/Garden Media Guild's Photographer of the Year.

While visually appealing and informative, the book goes beyond the typical style and intent of an art/coffee-table book. It's obvious that more editorial and design thought went into it. For text and photographs working together openly and implicitly are like a memorable guided walking tour through each of the gardens.

According to my sister, for whom this book was a gift, this IS THE PRIMO BOOK ON GARDENS IN THE U.S. I was surprized that it had a garden in my home state that I plan to visit this spring. I love to garden and visit gardens too, but my sister is a landscape architect and still is impressed with the quality of the paper, thus photos as well as the lengthy descriptions of each one; she said she will read and reread it many times over. A real hit!

This beautiful book showcases some of the most spectacular gardens in the United States, illustrated with stunning photographs and engaging text. The author can be critical and opinionated at times but his descriptions and history of the gardens and garden owners is fascinating and humorous (the story of Lotusland's creator Ganna Walska is quite amusing). He discusses the various garden styles and their influences and all types are well represented. Most of the gardens are well known but there are a few surprises and I wondered why some gardens were not included (The Biltmore Garden in N.C. for example).

The gardens included in this book include Kykuit, Vizcaya, Hither Lane, Dumbarton Oaks, LongHouse Reserve, Windcliff, Naumkeag, Huntington Botanical Gardens (desert garden only), Innisfree, Cornerstone Place, Middleton Place, Lotusland, Donnell Garden, Stan Hywet, Rifkind Garden, Les Quatre Vents, Monticello, Baja Garden, Chanticleer, Filoli, Lurie Garden, Miller Garden, Longwood, Metis Garden Festival, Bloedel Reserve.

I got this for my sister-in-law who has an amazing green thumb. This book has gardens that I've visited and it brings back the stunning beauty that American gardeners have created through out history.

Buy this book for the writing, not for the photographs. Tim Richardson's text is excellent, giving the reader fascinating background to the historical context of each garden as well as fresh insights to the artistic, emotional, cultural, and even spiritual motivations that lead to the creation of each of them, but he is not served well by Andrea Jones's photographs. While there are scattered examples of pictures that are really lovely, a lot of the photographs are poorly exposed because the photographer had the misfortune of visiting many of the featured gardens on brightly lit, sunny days - very difficult light conditions for garden photography. Consequently, there are many pictures with dark shadows and high contrast (including the cover!) that diminish their effectiveness.