The Garden: A Year at Home Farm Book

The Garden is a deeply romantic book, and a remarkably rewarding one. Dan Pearson has been supervising the development of the garden at Home Farm since 1987. Here he describes its growth from the wreckage of a derelict farm into a rich and beautiful part of the Northampton landscape. There is now a Woodland Garden, a Lime Enclosure, a Thyme Lawn, a Vegetable Garden and a large pond: these and the other parts of the garden allow Dan Pearson to explore many aspects of the British garden. The Garden follows the course of a year, charting in detail at once practical and highly personal the intensive work and thought that shape this magical place. The result is highly absorbing, the garden itself the main character in the narrative, responding to the seasons, flourishing under the endless care devoted to it. The tutelary name invoked is that of Beth Chatto, and her principle of ecological planting is adhered to. Nothing is forced, everything is natural: the roses that, after a few years, develop mildew are removed rather than subjected to a chemical war of attrition. Dan Pearson is clearly devoted to this garden, as well he might be. It seems to be part of his soul. --Robin DavidsonRead More