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Cottage Garden

Can anyone point me to any good resources/ books on Cottage Garden style gardening and planting?

Posts

  • punkdocpunkdoc Posts: 15,039
    I think Carol Klein wrote Life in a Cottage Garden. I haven’t read it, but it will be good, because all her stuff is. She also did a TV series, I think with the same name, which was certainly excellent.
    How can you lie there and think of England
    When you don't even know who's in the team

    S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
  • AnniDAnniD Posts: 12,585
    Also look for Geoff Hamilton's Cottage Gardens book (also on dvd).
    Clive Lane of The Cottage Garden Society has also written a couple of books.
    Andrew Sankey's book English Cottage Garden has very good reviews but l haven't read it myself. 
  • Pete.8Pete.8 Posts: 11,340
    The Geoff Hamilton DVD set that includes Cottage Gardens is excellent.
    I highly recommend it-
    https://www.amazon.co.uk/Geoff-Hamilton-Collection-Anniversary-Gardeners/dp/B000R343M6/ref=pd_lpo_1?pd_rd_i=B000R343M6&psc=1

    It's a lovely gentle watch from the best GW presenter ever! :)

    Billericay - Essex

    Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
    Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
  • JellyfireJellyfire Posts: 1,139
    I’d heartily recommend ‘Create a cottage garden’ by Kathy Brown, it has about 50 or so border planting schemes for every scenario imaginable - sunny border, half shade bother, gravel by side of house, stone steps, front gate etc, with plants and maintenance instructions. It’s quite old so most of the plants are very traditional, the cover is a bit naff but the illustrations inside are lovely 
  • _Nicolas__Nicolas_ Posts: 48
    AnniD said:
    Also look for Geoff Hamilton's Cottage Gardens book (also on dvd).
    Clive Lane of The Cottage Garden Society has also written a couple of books.
    Andrew Sankey's book English Cottage Garden has very good reviews but l haven't read it myself. 
    Another vote for Clive Lane, hard to beat The Cottage Gardener's Companion IMHO for what it packs into such a slim book, it has great historical grounding but also recommends some better modern cultivars of traditional plants! 
  • andrewnewtonandrewnewton Posts: 155
    Try the modern cottage garden by Greg Loades. Brings the cottage garden style with a more modern twist.
    Can I recommend you search out your local library to give you the widest range at the lowest cost
  • FireFire Posts: 19,096
    There are loads of delectable English Garden magazines that are worth a neb, just for the pictures. Gardens Illustrated and The English Garden are quite glorious and pretty cottagey. I recommend getting a few back copies on Ebay to try them out.


  • This is all great folks, thank you all!
  • GardenerSuzeGardenerSuze Posts: 5,692
    @ciaranmcgrenera I love to see Cottage Gardening done well. It is very time consuming and very skillful.
    I have worked as a Gardener for 24 years. My latest garden is a new build garden on heavy clay.
  • @ciaranmcgrenera I love to see Cottage Gardening done well. It is very time consuming and very skillful.
    I’m a long way from doing it well! I love it though, so I want to at least try to develop towards it.
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