Well Designed Mixed Garden: Building Beds and Borders With Trees, Shrubs, Perennials, Annuals, and Bulbs - Hardcover

DiSabato-Aust, Tracy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0881925594 ISBN 13: 9780881925593

Publisher: Timber Press, 2003

Synopsis

"The Well-Designed Mixed Garden" is a design book with a difference. Written for gardeners who are passionate about plants of all kinds (hence the 'mixed garden' of the title), it reflects decades of professional experience and artistic innovation. As with her bestselling book, "The Well-Tended Perennial Garden", master designer and plantswoman Tracy DiSabato-Aust provides not only inspiration but also scrupulously organized information on design and connoisseur plants - all from original research dating back to her degree work in horticulture. This paperback reprint is a master class of design fundamentals, with an emphasis on often-neglected topics, such as site evaluation, color theory, and planning for maintenance. It is also a gallery of detailed design plans that show how ideas are put onto paper and then translated into three dimensions. Lessons learned in its first two parts are strengthened in 'An Encyclopedia of Plant Combinations'; each entry notes the design considerations at play and provides tips on how to keep the combination looking its best. And the lifetime care needs and unique design characteristics of featured plants are summarized in the useful charts and lists that conclude the book. The result is a nearly foolproof guide to every aspect of designing superior gardens with superior plants. With more than 250 color photos and illustrations, this book is as much a feast for the eyes as it will be a trusted reference for the library shelf.

About this title

About the Author

Tracy DiSabato-Aust, aka "the Queen of Deadheading," has earned international acclaim as one of America's most entertaining and knowledgeable garden writers and professional speakers. She has extensive experience in the United States and abroad, working for over 30 years in the industry, speaking for over 25 years and designing for over 20 years. Her experience includes stints at Longwood Gardens in the U.S., The Montreal Botanical Garden in Canada, the Kalmthout Arboretum in Belgium, and Knightshayes Court in England. She earned a B.S. and M.S. in Horticulture from The Ohio State University. Her first book, The Well-Tended Perennial Garden, which has been referred to by many as "the bible for perennial maintenance," has become Timber Press' best selling book in their publishing history. Her second book, The Well-Designed Mixed Garden, brings her trademark exuberance, expertise, and efficiency to bear on frequently daunting elements of garden design, demystifying them with her direct approach. Tracy is a gifted and award winning designer who combines artistic vision with practical horticultural strategies. DiSabato-Aust is a frequent guest on national garden television and radio gardening shows. She is a dynamic speaker, and in great demand nationally and internationally on the lecture circuit. Venues include England's Royal Horticultural Society Garden, Wisley, The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, The English Gardening School, the Oxford Botanic Garden, the Smithsonian Institute, the Perennial Plant Association, and numerous botanical gardens and professional association meetings. She was awarded the 2004 Garden Media Award from the Perennial Plant Association. This award recognizes an individual whose educational and promotional efforts have resulted in a heightened awareness of perennials and the perennial industry. Tracy has contributed articles or been featured in numerous national and international magazines, books, and newspapers. Magazines include: Fine Gardening (she is a contributing editor), Horticulture, Country Gardens, Garden Gate, Organic Gardening, Midwest Living, American Nurseryman, Real Simple, and Garden Design. The New York Times, the Daily Telegraph in London, England, and the National Post, (Toronto, Canada) have all published articles on Tracy. When she's not out working in the garden, Tracy is working out in the gym. A self-professed "fitness fanatic," Tracy is a competitive triathlete who also appears in fitness training DVDs. She currently resides in Ohio with her husband and son.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

When gardens that you've visited linger pleasantly in your memory, what do they look like? Do they have trees above to protect you? Are the trees underplanted with rhododendrons, hellebores, and daffodils? Perhaps there are old-fashioned roses, whose fragrance you can almost still smell. Around the roses are alliums, foxgloves, and dianthus, the wall behind may be covered with honeysuckle and clematis. A group of nigella in soft blue, seeded from the previous season, adds a soft grace to the romantic scene. Maybe you remember a garden with the bold tropical foliage of cannas, the bright yellow flowers of heliopsis, the swaying panicles of miscanthus. The enlivening scene was grounded by the solidarity of a boxwood hedge. These picturesque images are of mixed gardens, the gardens I find to be the most spectacular and emotionally rewarding.

A mixed garden is one that is planted with a combination of herbaceous (soft-stemmed) and woody plant material. Trees and shrubs, roses, and perhaps large-growing ornamental grasses may give the garden its outlining structure. Herbaceous perennials and annuals, along with spring- and summer-flowering bulbs, vines, and sometimes vegetables, fill the remaining space. The planting is diverse, derived from a wide palette of plant material, making for a garden that has interest and function year-round. Varied textures, forms, and colors abound in a mixed garden. The rhythm of undulating plant heights and habits makes for a dynamic scene. Planting in layers, utilizing all available space, frees the designer and gardener to choose from the wider variety of plant material; space is used more creatively and efficiently. Sections of light and shadow provide the ability to grow sun- and shade-loving plants in close proximity. Mixed gardens are particularly important for small spaces, where the luxury of separate spaces for a shrubbery (shrub border), an annual bed, and a perennial garden are not possible.

What I call mixed gardens or borders are often an extension of the traditional perennial border, yet they offer several advantages over a strictly herbaceous garden. The framework of deciduous and evergreen shrubs or trees can add tremendously to the winter garden. Annuals, tropicals, and early spring, summer, and autumn bulbs further extend the season of interest in a mixed garden. We need not rely on flowers for the predominant interest but can look to fruit, bark, and autumn color from the woodies to provide further drama. Vines incorporated to utilize the vertical space in the garden can add scale if used on a freestanding structure such as an obelisk, or they might soften a wall or hide a fence. Aligned as it is with planting in nature, a mixed garden often has a more natural feel to it than a purely perennial or annual planting. Hearken back to fourth-grade science (yikes!) and its lessons about the layers of the forest: canopy, understory, shrubs, and herbaceous groundcovers. For plantaholics — those of us who love all kinds of plants, no matter if they are herbaceous or woody — planting a mixed border better satisfies our fanatical plant-lust. It turns a collection of plants into an artistic garden.

Edition details

• Publisher: Timber Press
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0881925594
• ISBN 13: 9780881925593
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 460