Customer Reviews

Planting the Natural Garden

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

 

 

After reading the foreward for this book, I was expecting to be able to learn about how Piet Oudolf designs, however there isn't any information regarding his designs in this book other than what plants he likes to use and the environment requirements for those plants. It's an interesting book, just not what I was looking for at the time.

This book offers a comprehensive list of the plants used and developed by Piet Oudolf. And list them under a few different categories of uses as well as offering their colors, heights, and a couple other traits. If you want to start a business in the likeness of Oudolf I think this listing of plants offers a extensively comprehensive if not brute force method for doing so. Of course if one wants to design gardens of this complexity a few classes on art or design would definitely not hurt as design work takes training of the mind and eye and Piet's gardens are very complex. His approach is also intuitive (in my opinion) and therefore training/practice is more than likely a must.

I had high expectations of learning more about the thought process that goes into the creation of Oudolf's garden's, useful information on structures and habits of particular plants. However there is none of that. The photos of gardens are beautiful and you can learn from looking - but info on individual plants is pretty minimal, and there is no discussion on the creating aspect of the gardens. I wouldn't recommend it.