Topiary, knots and parterres come in many guises, from the grand and imposing to the humble and folksy. In this book Caroline Foley with the aid of diarists, writers, wits, designers, gardeners and garden owners traces their story through the centuries and across the world.

Starting from the topiary of patrician Rome, she moves through the paradise gardens of Islam and the medieval hortus conclusus to the formal parterres of Renaissance Italy, the more elaborate broderies of the royal French gardens, the complicated conceits of the Tudors and the geometry of the Dutch school. She takes a wry look at the eighteenth century, when many fine formal gardens were scrapped in favour of the English landscape movement (which, in fact, was no less artificial). In the nineteenth century there was a revival of parterres filled with tender bedding plants.

Green architecture returned with the Arts and Crafts movement, and the twentieth century saw a joyful resurgence of the topiary peacock and other such conceits, the arrival of the Japanese minimalist school, the cult of the venerable sagging hedge, cloud pruning and the emergence of the cool crisp lines of modernism. German perennial planting, juxtaposed with sharply cut linear hedges, has provided a clever solution to the modern requirements of high style, low maintenance and attention to the environment and to labour costs. Of late a new type of formality has emerged among designers and landscape architects, involving wild-looking prairie planting set off by large-scale sculptural topiary.

As Caroline Foley points out, 'Serious or frivolous . . . topiary always has character and presence. While wonderfully impressive when it takes the form of an immaculate battlemented bastion, it has poetry and possibly even greater charm when it is overblown and blowsy with age. Either way, it will always be a win-win proposition.'

About the Author

Caroline Foley is the author of twelve books, among them three bestsellers: Practical Allotment Gardening (New Holland, 2002), The Allotment Handbook (New Holland, 2004), and Of Cabbages and Kings: The History of Allotments (Frances Lincoln, 2014). She has been the editor of Topiarius, the pan-European journal of the European Boxwood and Topiary Society, for the past twelve years.

Reviews

"A wonderful resource and engaging work."

* Plant Talk, New York Botanical Garden *

"Highly recommended for anyone interested in the fascinating history of topiary or gardening."

* Library Journal *

"Packed with historical detail and offers plenty of visual inspiration."

-- Anne Swithinbank * World of Interiors *

"Beautifully written, lavishly - nay, opulently - illustrated, I'll be cross if this book doesn't win its author a prize or itself attract a distinctive award."

* Hortus *

"A work of scholarship to be cherished"

* The Irish Garden *

"Inspiring"

* Professional Gardener *

"A refreshing look at the general history of gardens with special reference to topiary and formal parterres. Foley's enjoyable style means that she gets her historic points over easily. A book to enjoy and learn from - and then to return to."

* Historic Gardens Foundation Newsletter *

"This carefully researched an entertaining book will be valuable not only to gardeners and those with an interest in garden development and history, it will also provide an excellent research book for students of horticulture and landscape. It is packed with information, diagrams and photographs and written in a lively style.

* Reckless Gardener *

"Demonstrates that this most ancient of traditions is alive and kicking, refreshed and reinterpreted by contemporary garden and landscape designers to look as relevant today as it was to the Romans. You will be reaching for those shears."

* Sunday Times *
"Since its inception a couple of years ago, Pimpernel Press has carved a niche as the garden library-building publisher. Classics-not forgotten but in need of a re-boot-have been reissued, along with more recherche flights of fancy. An essential addition is Topiary, Knots and Parterres, published today. Yes, it's about clipping greenery, but it's also a universal subject, covering the full gamut, as the author Caroline Foley points out, 'from the ridiculous to the sublime.'" * Gardenista.com *

"A magnificent hardback comprising authoritative text matched with excellent, well-researched illustrations."

* The English Garden *

"Topiary has a long history, exhaustively explored in this book...The illustrations are superb. Every page brings a new wonder."

-- Anna Pavord * House & Garden *


Awards
Winner of European Garden Book Award 2018 (Germany).



Book Information
ISBN 9781910258187
Author Caroline Foley
Format Hardback
Page Count 288
Imprint Pimpernel Press Ltd
Publisher Pimpernel Press Ltd