Kathryn Bradley-Hole – författare

Beloved for their informality, cottage gardens champion organic and unstructured spaces overflowing with textures and colors while welcoming self-sown plants and bulbs popping up and spreading on their own. Appearing casual, everything is done with great intent. From humble origins in medieval England and Colonial America, this style arose as a practical approach ornamentals and edibles intermingling and supporting each other before being elevated by great garden designers Gertrude Jekyll, William Robinson, Vita Sackville-West, Margery Fish, and Rosemary Verey. Today, concerns about food traceability, reducing waste and chemical use, and supporting pollinators and wildlife have rekindled interest in cottage gardening. Taking a 360-degree view, this book covers plant combinations, paths and walls, water features, keeping chickens or bees, and extending the season, as well as promoting traditional, organic practices such as composting, rain harvesting, and succession planting.

It seems that almost everyone who has access to outside space, however small or large, wants to make the most of it. Interest in growing plants in ecologically sensitive ways that support pollinators, butterflies, birds, and other wildlife is a very strong strand in the new consciousness of garden making. It goes hand in hand with organic principles that shun the use of short-term, quick-fix chemical solutions that have an overall damaging effect on soil and the environment. As the gardens in this book demonstrate, there need be no loss of visual impact or creativity when taking environmental concerns into account. With examples from all over the world, the gardens showcased here serve diverse needs--from twenty-first-century public green spaces to modern cottage gardens and from large country gardens to intimate city courtyards--across a wide range of climates and soils. They have been created with elegance and style, alongside their makers' efforts to work with, rather than against, nature and support the complex web of life that so frequently struggles to coexist with human habitation or agriculture. Interspersed throughout are illustrated essays outlining relevant topics, including: supporting wildlife; the challenges of seaside gardening; incorporating seeds and fruit; grasses, meadows, and prairie plantings; coping with heat and drought; and the important role of trees. Featuring more than thirty gardens from across the globe with photographs by leading garden photographers, including Richard Bloom, Andrea Jones, Marianne Majerus, Alessio Mei, Clive Nichols, and Ngoc Minh Ngo, the book showcases the beauty and visual impact produced by ecologically friendly garden design principles. As the world wakes up to the effects of climate change and the consequent strains on natural resources, today's garden makers are responding in creative way.