Product Description

A pioneer in organic gardening, Lady Salisbury revived two of the great historic gardens in England and created others for notables like the Prince of Wales at Highgrove. Now in her 80s, this biography not only shares her stories, but her gardening secrets. "The Green Goddess of English gardens ... high priestess of historic garden design." (New York Times) "Some of her passing comments are worth whole handbooks of theoretical advice." (Financial Times)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #416971 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-23
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 224 pages

Review
"'The Green Goddess of English gardens... high priestess of historic garden design' The New York Times 'The greatest gardener of the twentieth century' Sir Roy Strong 'Her knowledge is phenomenal, her taste is exquisite, and her enthusiasm boundless.' The English Garden 'I doubt if anyone else alive has done quite so much now over quite such an area. Some of her passing comments are worth whole handbooks of theoretical advice.' Robin Lane Fox, Financial Times"

Financial Times
"Some of her passing comments are worth whole handbooks of theoretical advice."

About the Author
DERRY MOORE is an internationally known photographer of gardens and more, whose work appears in magazines like Country Life and Architectural Digest.

Customer Reviews

FOR THOSE WHO LOVE GARDENS, NATURE, AND ALL THINGS BEAUTIFUL


Leafing the pages of this beautifully wrought gardener's diary is very much like drawing open curtains on a summer morning and finding your room filled with sunlight. The photographs by Derry Moore are incredibly beautiful from Jeff Koons' Puppy to the protective shadows and dappled greens of a terrace border on a cloudless afternoon. There are some 150 color photos in the 224 pages, and each is a feast for the eyes.

Lady Salisbury, we learn, has always been drawn to gardens. As a youngster she tended to small areas in her parents' gardens. From this initial interest grew an abiding love and enormous responsibility as she later became chatelaine of England's Cranborne Manor and Hatfield House, where she brought these great groundss to renewed life.

In a description of her childhood gardens she writes, "From my earliest consciousness, I have noticed plants..." She was, she says, awakened by her mother's roses and the instructions she received as to how to cut a rose for a vase and how to prune roses to encourage reflowering. Little did she dream then that she would become a professional garden designer with commissions from throughout the world and count among her clients the Prince of Wales and the New York Botanical Garden.

Lady Salisbury has spent her life doing what she loved, and to this writing actively continues although she is in her 80s. She is the woman the New York Times called "The Green Goddess of English Gardens," while others refer to her as the "greatest gardener of the twentieth century."

In photographs and words A Gardener's Life is her biography, and a joyous one it is. This volume serves not only as a chronicle of her work but as a guide for us, sure to be relished by those who love gardens, nature, and all things beautiful.

- Gail Cooke