The British garden writer, cook, florist, botanist, broadcaster and podcaster Sarah Raven is a familiar name in the world of gardening as is her garden Perch Hill in East Sussex, which provides the inspiration for her most recent book, A Year Full of Pots: Container Flowers for All Seasons (Bloomsbury Publishing, £27), which is packed full of inspirational photos and practical advice. Raven’s unrivalled knowledge of her subject plus her exceptional flair for creating memorably beautiful displays combine to make this a brilliant guide to creative container growing. “With pots,” she tells her readers, “there is one cast-iron rule: more is more.”
Regarded as one of the world’s foremost experts on herbs, the British writer, grower, nursery-owner, RHS vice-president and organic gardener Jekka McVicar has amassed a wealth of knowledge and expertise on the subject, which she shares generously in her latest book, 100 Herbs to Grow: A Comprehensive Guide To The Best Culinary And Medicinal Herbs (Penguin, £30). From practical tips on propagation, harvesting and storage to their history of culinary and medicinal use, the author shines a richly illuminating light on this endlessly useful group of plants.
The west Wicklow-based gardener and artist TJ Maher’s exceptional country garden is celebrated for its flamboyant use of colour, intricate perennial planting combinations and painterly container displays as well as its owner’s deep reverence for nature. Maher’s first book, Grounded in the Garden (Pimpernel Press, patthanagardenireland.com, €30), is a thoughtful contemplation on the many ways in which it sustains him spiritually but also offers plenty of expert, planet-friendly gardening advice to readers on how to create a little slice of it for themselves.
Growing Beauty (gardenfable.com, €30) by the Kilkenny-based garden designer Des Doyle is an engrossing and insightful reflection on the deeply personal art and craft of garden-making as well as the many ways in which the author’s own garden at Lavistown House has anchored him in difficult times. Filled with nuggets of seasoned horticultural advice, his passion for plants and his love of the natural world shine through. So, too, does his artist’s eye (before coming to garden design, the author was a successful jeweller), making this a book that’s both practical and profound.
With 45 years of experience as an organic market gardener under his belt, the well-known kitchen gardener, Youtuber and no-dig advocate Charles Dowding’s hard-won knowledge of what it takes to make great garden compost can’t be bettered. In his new book Compost (Dorling Kindersley, £14.99) he explains the science behind the art. A really useful, practical guide filled with clever tips, clear illustrations, and informative advice on building/selecting the most suitable bin for your garden or allotment, it does a lot to demystify the process while reassuring gardeners of the countless benefits that it brings.
After several decades where perennial planting has reigned supreme in the world of naturalistic garden design, Shrouded in Light: Naturalistic Planting Inspired by Wild Shrublands (Filbert Press, £40) by Kevin Philip Williams and Michael Guidi marks a significant shift. Written from a contemporary ecological view point, it analyses a dozen different wild shrub communities in the US and the important lessons they offer gardeners around the world in terms of creating similarly resilient, climate-appropriate, shrubby planting schemes, or “shrubscapes”, “shrub lands” and “shrub mosaics”, as the authors variously describe them. They firmly put to bed the outdated notion of shrubs as the frumps of the plant kingdom, encouraging readers to reimagine them in a modern light. Underscoring the text is a hum of urgency. “Partnering with shrubs to create new worlds out of our fragmented, highly altered, mutating planet,” write the authors, “is imperative for the survival of things.”
British gardener and writer Olivia Laing’s A Garden Against Time: In Search of a Common Paradise (Picador, £20) tells the story of her restoration of a historic walled garden in Sussex – an overgrown Eden of unusual plants – while simultaneously reflecting on the many essential truths about humankind revealed to us by our gardens. Written with a rare combination of elegance, charm, poetry and erudition, it’s also a beautifully penned celebration of the intimate relationships forged between all passionate gardeners and their gardens. “There is no point looking for Eden on a map,” she concludes. “It’s a dream that is carried in the heart ... each incomplete attempt to establish it is like a seed that travels on the wind.”
The highly respected photographer-publisher Andrew Montgomery and garden writer Clare Foster have already proven themselves a formidable duo with the publication of their first book, the award-winning The Winter Garden in 2021. Their second, Pastoral Gardens (montgomerypress.co.uk, £55), is a gloriously written, sumptuously illustrated and beautifully produced publication – a near-gluttonous feast for the senses – featuring 20 exceptional gardens around the world from Knepp Walled Garden in Sussex and the Bannerman’s garden in Somerset to Umberto Pasti’s garden in Tangiers and gardens in Connecticut and Africa designed respectively by Dan Pearson and Jinny Blom. Published by Montgomery Press, the small independent imprint established by Andrew Montgomery “to produce high quality, beautifully designed art books”, it’s one to treasure.
Along with farmers, gardeners are uniquely placed to witness first-hand the countless small but significant signs of climate change as well as its adverse effects. Faced with something so complex and far-reaching, it can be hard to retain a sense of optimism. In One Garden Against the World: In Search of Hope in a Changing Climate (Bloomsbury, £18.99), author Kate Bradbury offers much-needed reassurance that every individual effort we make to help the natural world to flourish makes a difference.
