a gardening book review
Book title: Planting: A New Perspective
Author(s): Piet Oudolf & Noel Kingsbury
Photographer(s) / Illustrator: various
Type of book: gardening, garden planning, plant selection
Publisher: Timber Press (Portland, Oregon)
Year: 2013
Length: 280 pages
quick thoughts
Two of the most innovative garden designers share their original planting plans for naturalistic plantings, for home gardeners and professionals alike to learn how to create their own.
gardening content
amount of information: This is a weighty hardcover book at 280 pages. But it’s justified with dense paragraphs of background and information. Organized starting with the macro view of naturalistic planting down to the micro, with groupings and individual plant recommendations. Again, it’s a lot of information, but also incredibly useful and inspiring.
quality of info: “The use of long-lived perennials in conjunction with woody plants…” (p.9) has been a cornerstone of planting for ecological / biodiversity reasons. Piet (pronouced Pete) and Noel have been at the forefront of this thinking since the mid-1980’s.
I love the photo caption on page 10: “Only time will tell how it will work out.” Gardening is the long game, even after you’ve left this patch. So you do your best to follow best practices, and leave this soil better than how you found it.
citations: Their body of work speaks for itself. People in the US will recognize Piet’s hand in the Lurie Garden (Chicago), Battery Park and the High Line (NYC), and most recently the Calder Garden (Philadelphia).
Noel has a storied career in the UK, with his most recent public project being the Queen Elizabeth Garden in London’s Regents Park.
book presentation
cover: Beautiful photo by Piet on the cover of the garden on the property of him and his wife, Anja. She helped run their nursery where they focused on the perennial plants Piet would use in his first gardens.
The spine, which wraps around and onto the front and back cover, are plans for one of the gardens Piet designed. It’s also reflected on the end paper.
layout – sections, chapters: The layout is fine. It’s a lot of information to cover, and the pages can be very information/text heavy, but they still intersperse plenty of photos and garden design sketches to keep it from feeling too much like a textbook.
photos, infographics: The vast majority of photos and planting plans are done by Piet himself, with the exceptions noted near the Acknowledgements section.
appendix / index / sources: Index, baby! Very thorough with not just plant/scientific names.
Further Reading section with numerous other books to check out.
Very detailed Plant Directory, with height, spread, planting density, foliage type, plant architecture (the form/shape of the plant), flower color, flowering season, structural interest, long-term performance, light and soil needs, and USDA zone, plus notes from Piet like Asperula odorata is “often summer-dormant.”
You can watch my video on YouTube!
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