Jul 152013
Planting: A New Perspective
Planting, by famed landscape architects Piet Oudolf and Noel Kingsbury, is a groundbreaking moment in horticulture. It is the first book to share Oudolf’s original planting plans and plant groupings and the only book to explicitly show how his gardens and landscapes are made.
An intimate knowledge of plants is essential to the success of this approach and Planting makes Oudolf’s considerable understanding of plant ecology and performance accessible, explaining how plants behave i
List Price: $ 39.95
Price: $ 22.74
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A New and Needed Perspective on Planting,
Anyone knowing Oudolf’s work is familiar with his aesthetic and how the images of his work draw you in. This new book is full of those images!
Yet the book is more than just pretty pictures – it has meat and a lot of it. Starting with ‘the big picture’ and moving into grouping and combining plants we dig deep into years of experience.
These chapters do not contain the plant by numbers information many other planting books have. On the contrary they contain the knowledge base you need to design a planting in Oudolf and Kingsbury’s style.
It may take a close reading or even a few readings of these sections to fully grasp all the information provided but it is worth delving into as it is the years of research and learning these two designers have done.
What I found the most useful in the book is the chapter on plant performance. Most of the planting designs today are based on what looks good where and little thought is given to how the planting will perform over the years to come.
Kingsbury gives us a list of parameters to look for when selecting plants and even provides a list of many perennials and how we should expect them to perform.
This book is a wonderful survey of the Ouddolf planting style a great addition to both Kingsbury and Oudolf’s other books.
Now why then did I leave that one star out if I think this book is so great? It is because the book is said to be written by Oudolf and Kingsbury but from page one you find the book is in Kingsbury’s voice and Oudolf is talked about in the third person. Although Kingsbury is an exceptional writer I miss Oudolf’s passion and flair.
So as a conclusion I do think this book is a must for every Landscape Architect and Designer that wants to know just how Oudolf does what he does. But more importantly I feel it is a stepping stone in the evolution of planting design that will bring about new ways to create landscapes and gardens.
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|One of the most valuable books on ecological planting design yet written.,
Noel Kingsbury is the great chronicler of contemporary planting design. Kingsbury is the most articulate and prolific writer on contemporary naturalism. I’m always eager to get his latest book.
Last week, I was received Planting: A New Perspective. Someone had described it to me as “Oudolf made accessible for the residential gardender.” Something about this description made me cringe. I’m not sure I could stand an Oudolf for Dummies–a stripped down version of Oudolf that would make every common landscaper capable of thoughtlessly replicating the Oudolf style. The idea of a simplified book also felt wrong. There were still so many questions left unanswered by Planting Design: what defines the “new style”? What role do native plant communities play in this style? Is it really possible to create a low maintenance, long-lasting version of the new style?
Let’s be clear: this book is not Oudolf for Dummies. And thank God for that. Any review that describes this simply as “Oudolf for home gardeners” has clearly not read beyond the dust jacket.
More than any of Oudolf/Kingsbury’s collaborations, Planting establishes the “new style” as a potent artistic and intellectual movement. This book has real meat. The liberal use of Oudolf’s planting plans are reason alone to buy this book. For the designer or gardener, these hand sketches are a Rosetta stone for understanding Oudolf’s process. This book delves deeply into compositional strategy: how are plants grouped, layered, and mixed based upon their unique structures and ecologies? Kingsbury’s recent doctoral work at Sheffield clearly comes through in the brilliantly explicated sections of perennial’s lifespans and competitive strategies. The book’s most valuable section may be its discussion of the work of other contemporary designers. It grounds the “new style” in a broader, more international perspective that ensures its endurance. Planting just might be one of the most valuable books on ecological planting design yet written.
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|Wonderful ideas from one of the best known garden designers,
As a fan of both Noel Kingsbury and Piet Oudolf, pre-ordering this book was a no-brainer. But the “real thing” has been far and away more than I could have anticipated in a gardening reference.
First, it was exciting to see several of my own planting combos shown here – to see that ideas that I came about on my own just by experimenting in our gardens were used by such esteemed designers gave my little plot some welcome credibility and gave me some positive feedback for my own gardening aesthetic. What was especially helpful was to see how I could enhance these groupings with the addition of another plant I would not have thought of on my own.
The plant performance chapter and the chapter on groupings have post-its marking them as they are invaluable. They provide critical information for being able to plan what to plant together and knowing the plant is going to look like during all 4 seasons, how it may spread, what you can expect in terms of performance, etc.
This is not a basic how to nor a book you sit down and read from cover to cover. This is a book that sits on your nightstand and that you use as a gardening planning and reference guide, day after day, and my guess is, season after season. I find myself walking through the garden, book in hand, looking at different beds in our garden and exploring new options for making them better. Or I will lie in bed, reviewing photos of the garden and comparing my amateur efforts with the designs in the book. There is no shortage of ideas, the photos are spectacular, and the information is a gardener’s dream.
My one regret is that this book wasn’t available in 2003 when I was designing my own gardens. It would have been immensely helpful to have had the benefit of much of this information then. However, I am understanding even better why some things worked and others didn’t, and how to make things that I have been struggling with even better.
This is not a basic guide, bit for someone who is a serious gardener with some room to plant some serious beds, it’s a definite “must have” on your reference shelf.
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