New Country Garden - Tapa dura

While town and city gardens are undergoing major transformations into decked , stainless steel and concrete living spaces, a quieter revolution is taking place in rural retreats. Cottage gardens are evolving in tune with today's green ideologies and where once a metal arch or obelisk would be used they are now made of hazel or willow. Pergolas and seating too are increasingly being made from natural materials and the understanding of organic gardening necessitates the addition of wildlife-friendly boundaries and water features. These ideas tumble over into a more relaxed form of planting. No longer is there a major autumn clear-up and cut-back, but flower heads and leaves are being left for wildlife whilst at the same time enhancing the winter landscape by their skeletal forms. Planting too is changing from the pastel hues of the past to the more vibrant colours of modern plants of today such as cannas and dahlias. Formal knot gardens are becoming less formal with a loose inner planting of ornamental grasses or blowsy meadow flowers. Hedgerows are left slightly overgrown to provide homes and food for wild creatures who in turn help with the control of pests in the garden. Lawns are turning into wildlife havens, increasingly becoming wild areas of natural flora and prairie-like grasses. Elspeth Thompson, most famous for her "Sunday Telegraph" magazine features brings these new country gardens to life with her engaging style of writing whilst the luscious photographs of Melanie Eclare illustrate the variety and beauty of these bucolic havens. As the subtitle of this book so succinctly puts it, this is "A Plant Lover's Paradise".

There has been a quiet revolution in country gardens, with country dwellers creating exciting new outside spaces. Plants remain at the heart of these gardens, but are used in strikingly new ways - with a wild mix of height, scale and colour. Traditional cottage garden flowers meet bold, architectural plants; evergreens come in new, graphic shapes; colour accents are stronger. The book explores the themes that characterize the new country garden. In A Plant Lover's Paradise, the cottage garden has been given a bold new look, while New Formal Gardens are elegantly modern. Family Gardens are flexible spaces where children's play harmonizes with adults' relaxation, and in Wildlife Gardens, grasses and wildflowers flourish beautifully.