Product Description

Offering a professional approach to garden design, the Handbook for Garden Designers follows the complete design process, from initial survey, draughting and planning, through to the successful completion of your plans. Providing the expertise necessary to tackle gardens of all kinds and sizes, the book includes over 100 plans, drawings, diagrams and pictures and is packed with practical advice, tips and techniques. Garden design involves everything from considering the soil and seasons, to supervising the construction of a garden and advising on future maintenance. This book will ensure that any budding designer, whether designing for themselves or a client, can successfully handle any brief.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #486790 in Books
• Published on: 2005-07-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 136 pages

About the Author
Rosemary Alexander FRSA is Principal of the English Gardening School at the Chelsea Physic Garden in London, where she teaches design and graphics. She also lectures at the New York Botanic Garden. Trained as a landscape architect, she has worked on a wide range of gardens in Europe, the Middle East and the USA and has an international reputation as a garden designer. Karena Batstone trained in garden design at the English Gardening School and has a successful practice in London, transforming city gardens and roof terraces.

Customer Reviews

excellent guide to design as a business.
This is an excellent book for the learner designer who wishes to present a professional approach to his/her clients. It takes one from the essential tools of the trade through to the site survey. How to's on drawing up the plan and developing the design. Presentation of plans to clients is critical and this is covered as is enhancing of the plans to visually help the client grasp the overall effect you are wishing to create. This is definately an essential guide for the newcomer to the profession of landscape design.

Too commercial for someone designing their own garden.
This book is aimed at the professional but I certainly wdn't pay anyone who had to use it. The advice it gives is good as far as it goes, but it is far too basic. On the other hand it isn't (in my opinion) suitable for the private person wanting to design their own garden because so much of it is aimed at impressing the client and winning the business.

I find Robin Williams' The Garden Planner far more useful, but then I'm just planning our own garden.

A gentle approach
The publication is in print only 6 years, but if you didn't look for the date, you would have thought this is a fifties classic... Old-fashioned, though gentle, the book might be useful for complete novices, who obviously possess more than reading skills...

Nevertheless, It takes a lot to be able to stand outdoors, in a to-be garden space, armed with a book, and start making marks! It takes inspiration, dedication and extensive skill, talent, knowledge and experience. What this volume does not offer is inspiration - that, of course, was not the brief. One must combine this reading with some 'Caffeine'-type publications to be able to make the leap...

The majority is in monochrome, and although retro, it actually helps focusing on the tasks. This book, no doubt, is a useful tool at the Chelsea Physic Garden School of Garden Design, where the authors teach.