Customer Reviews

Shady Retreats: 20 Plans for Colorful, Private Spaces in Your Backyard

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Reward yourself for gardening. Most of the gardeners I know love to get their hands in the dirt and work at whatever it takes to make their garden beautiful. But there comes a time to sit back, either alone or with friends and family, and just enjoy what you have created. This book gives you plans for twenty shady retreats where you can sit back, relax and just enjoy.

Each of the 20 retreats is shown in a painting by Gary Palmer (the idea of a painting rather than a photograph is a novel approach and it worked well with this topic) and a detailed design layout is provided too. I would have found it helpful if more construction details were included, but this is an idea book rather than a how-to book.

The strength of this book lies in the recurring themes such "Colour in the Shade" and "Ideas for Great Design" that enrich each of the major designs. There are also ideas of plants to selct for each and a goodly list of favourite shade plants at the end of the book.

The illustrations throughout the book are right on target with the theme and illustrate ways to incorporate your own requirements - peace? an active area? a working space? entertaining? - into a design for a shady retreat.

Definitely a reward book. Every gardener deserves a shady retreat like these.

I LOVE this book! So many designs to choose from. Great buy, gorgeous pictures.

Very good book to inspire you to find a "retreat" in your own backyard to rest, read, or just dream. The pictures and ideas are very inviting. Great book to add to my collection.

Shady Retreats: 20 Plans for Colorful, Private Spaces in Your Backyard
"Let me show you my private get-away", said the prospective client when she answered the door. Then, she led me into her back yard, overgrown with wild vegetation, and pointed to a clearing in its center, where slabs of antiquated patio stones paved the ground in the middle of the wild garden. There, she had placed an equally old, glass-topped, black, wrought iron table, with matching chairs. "This is where I eat my breakfast in the morning and sip martinis with friends in the late afternoon", she explained. "I love the sound of the birds chirping and the rustling of the wild foliage when the wind blows".

At very little cost, this homeowner created for herself a shady garden retreat, a secluded, private, destination. Whenever she visits that part of her property, she leaves behind her usual routine, enters a soothing oasis, and for the brief time that she spends there, readjusts the pace of her life. Here, she is at peace with herself, at one with nature, and ready to engage in any activity, relaxing or exciting, that brings her pleasure.

A shady retreat is in the range of possibility for most homeowners. All that is required is a bit of imagination and the guidance that this versatile publication supplies. With the help of the book's author Barbara W. Ellis, the architectural plans of Julie Burns, and the exquisite painted garden illustrations of Gary Palmer, any part of one's exterior home, no matter how small or large, can be transformed to serve as a retreat. Even a small porch or deck, will do.

To help the reader navigate the subject and select a retreat that best suits one's property and budget, the author presents twenty different plans. Each is elaborated in detail over several pages, starting with an awesome, painted rendition of the retreat at its completion. These illustrations give the book a dual purpose: It is both a versatile garden publication and an art book.

The illustrations for each plan are enriched with architectural drawings, complete with numerical references that indicate where specific plants and garden furnishings should be placed. A recommendation for suitable plants follows, along with ideas to enhance the basic design. For example, in the first plan, the author explains how a small retreat can be transformed to feel more interesting, deeper, and farther away, by winding a short path out of sight, behind shrubbery and trees.

Among the twenty potential areas around one's home that the author identifies for the creation of shady retreats are:- woodland edges, the terrace, a gazebo, a deck in the woods, a pool house, arbor, pergola, pavilion, seating area, a clearing in the woods, and a tree perch.

The book rounds out with an appendix listing plants that are appropriate for these projects. Each is described according to its contribution to overall garden design. Where useful, a list of preferred cultivars is included, as well as a short note on the special uses of each plant; some make effective ground cover, while others show at their best when they are grouped in drifts.

Storey Publishing prides itself on supplying the public with practical information that encourages independence, in harmony with the environment. This book is a successful realization of that goal. It has been a great pleasure to take this journey into shady garden retreats with the author.

I purchased this book while in the planning stages for adding a Japanese garden in a shady part of my yard. It was very helpful and informative.