A Pattern Garden: The Essential Elements of Garden Making [Illustrated] [Hardcover]

Valerie Easton (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 15, 2007

A Pattern Garden gives us the tools for creating our own highly satisfying garden spaces. Easton identifies 14 garden patterns that she sees as fundamental to successful design and that will turn any landscape into a memorable and rewarding retreat. This book will help you identify what pleases you, and why, and provide inspiration and direction in the planting and layout of your own garden. Discussions of essential patterns, such as the creation of paths or the incorporation of water into the garden, are complemented by concrete advice about plant selection.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Garden columnist and notable garden-maker Easton awakened decades ago to the notion of pattern in the garden. Evocative writing and lush photography clarify Easton's approach to patterns as elements in designing gardens at once inviting and deeply satisfying. The budding garden designer will find help in assessing the site and learning the importance of proportion to harmony, and will be introduced to distinctive ways that rooms and paths, gates and sheltering structures can be incorporated for the most pleasing effects. Destination points are examined as critical to a garden's success. And water features, ornamentation, and plantings are given due attention, showing the power of juxtaposition, and potential for creative innovation. Offering an enticing meditation on why we seek sanctuary in our gardens, Easton sets the stage for an inclusive approach to design regardless of one's chosen garden style; a relevant and appealing guide for gardeners seeking advice, uplift, and wide-ranging options. Alice Joyce
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"Ms. Easton has an accessible, down-to-earth style in the book...one is led to believe that even the most rank beginner should just do it: go ahead and decide where the path should go, imagine where it will lead, and what might lie, like a surprise, or a sanctuary, at the end." The New York Times, June 21 , 2007

"A Pattern Garden reveals the hidden relationships between scale and structure that define truly great gardens...Easton will open your eyes to a new way of seeing the design opportunities inherent in any garden site." Scot Medbury, CEO Brooklyn Botanic Garden

"Easton offers ...a horticultural Rosetta Stone—a guide for both timid and more confident homeowners to map their outdoor life and create their dream space." Thomas Hobbs, author of The Jewel Box Garden

The dry days of June are good for redesigning the garden. For great ideas on the subject, pick up A Pattern Garden. Sunset, June 2007

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 216 pages
• Publisher: Timber Press (February 15, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0881927805
• ISBN-13: 978-0881927801
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 9.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #999,981 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Valerie Easton is a weekly garden columnist for Pacific Northwest Magazine of The Seattle Times. Her own low-maintenance garden, the muse for this book, has been published in The New York Times, This Old House, and Horticulture. She has contributed articles on gardens, homes, and the people who make them to a variety of magazines, including Metropolitan Home, Fine Gardening, and Gardens Illustrated. Valerie trained as a Master Gardener and was for eighteen years the horticultural librarian at the University of Washington in Seattle. She gardens, teaches yoga, and blogs (www.valeaston.com) in the village of Langley, on Whidbey Island, Washington. Her previous book is A Pattern Garden (www.apatterngarden.com).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Superb Book from Ms. Easton, March 7, 2007

By 

David N. Lewis "Little and Lewis" (Bainbridge Island, Wa USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Pattern Garden: The Essential Elements of Garden Making (Hardcover)

We have been following Ms. Easton's garden writings for years in newspapers, magazines and her other acomplished manuscripts Artists In Their Gardens and Plant Life. We have found her writings to be both informative and entertaining, a hard combination for many authors but critical to the reader. Her newest book, A Pattern Garden, weaves a rich tapestry of information and soulful thinking. The garden is a place of sanctuary and highly personal. Ms.Easton takes the essential 14 "patterns" of our gardens and helps us clarify their role and importance. She offers us tools to both strengthen and personalize an existing garden and lay the foundation to build a new one. In reading this book we felt empowered to try new things and be adventuresome. It also gave us a greater understanding and enjoyment of our own garden.

Besides all the practical information offered, A Pattern Garden is a must read for anyone who wants to have a greater appreciation of their connection with the garden, nature, and the role it plays in their life.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sensuous, thoughtful gardening insights, March 6, 2007

By 

D. Loudon (Washington State) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Pattern Garden: The Essential Elements of Garden Making (Hardcover)

For years, I have enjoyed Valerie Easton's stylish books and weekly articles in the Seattle Times. I am consistently inspired by her gardening and design knowledge and the sensible, easy way she communicates her ideas. Having just received her new book, A Pattern Garden, I am totally wowed by the incredible photographs and gorgeous layout of this showpiece - it is a stunningly beautiful book. Staying true to her straightforward approach, Ms. Easton has taken gardening to a new level of thoughtful interpretation. Keeping her ideas accessible for lay gardeners such as myself, she has successfully described the "feeling" of a great garden, making it something tangible and attainable. This is a must-have book for everyone who tends a garden - a wonderful exploration into the heart and spirit of the gardens we instinctively find attractive and to which we feel emotionally connected. I can't wait to incorporate some of these concepts into my garden. This book is destined to be a garden design classic.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential Reading, March 6, 2007

By 

Daniel J. Hinkley "Daniel Hinkley, plantsman" (Indianola, WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Pattern Garden: The Essential Elements of Garden Making (Hardcover)

There have been numerous occasions throughout my gardening career- in my garden and while working in others- that I have turned to garden design books for inspiration and guidance. Too often it has been case that these books- many now considered classics- illuminate principles of design that are inapplicable to the average gardener, i.e., the gardener who cannot afford a top end designer. From the moment I opened Val Easton's book, I discovered at last a book which was charged with bursts of creative esprit, an inviting and understandable format and an engaging dialogue between Easton and her readers. In concert with outstanding and well interpreted photography, I believe this book should find its way into every serious gardeners library.