Colour Schemes for the Flower Garden

by Gertrude Jekyll, Graham Stuart Thomas (Introduction)

Octavo, 1983, PP.159, Introduced And Revised By Graham Stuart Thomas, ONe Of Her More Popular Books, It Is An Amazing Work Considering Her Myopia And Better Understood In That Context

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction, Reference, Horticulture

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1908

About the author

Gertrude Jekyll was an influential British garden designer, writer, and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the UK, Europe and the USA and contributed over 1,000 articles to Country Life, The Garden and other magazines.

Reviews

[Melissa Embry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Despite all the great gardeners who have followed her, Gertrude Jekyll remains the iconic garden designer of the modern age. This 2001 paperback update of her classic 1914 "Colour Schemes for the Flower Garden" includes not only her sumptuous writing, such as this from Chapter XV, "Some Garden Pictures": ". . . there are some days during the summer when the quality of light seems to tend to an extraordinary beauty of effect. I have never been able to find out how the light on these occasions differs from that of ordinary find summer days, but, when these days come, I know them and am filled with gladness," but samples of her original black and white photographs as well as modern color photos that illustrate her principles.

"Her greatest contribution to English culture was to reassert the position of gardening as a fine art," Richard Bisgrove wrote in his preface to the modern edition. I would change "English culture" to "world culture." Even those of us who lack Jekyll's 200-foot long high summer border or her 10 acres of woodland rich in garden pictures of rhododendrons and lilies can find inspiration to shape our smaller spaces.

But she is kind, too, to the issues of small gardeners, writing about the arrangement plants in pots (even to making suggestions for pot colors) and against walls and buildings, and in her delight -- and ours -- in aiming at "something quite simple and devoid of complication; generally one thing or a very limited number of flowering things at a time, but that one, or those few things, carefully placed so as to avoid fuss, and give pleasure to the eye and ease to the mind."

Thanks are also due in this new edition to John Kelly for updating Jekyll's nomenclature, so that gardeners will not seek in vain for the magnificent foliage plant Funkia when taxonomists have changed its name to Hosta, or for the little blue daisy she knew as Agathea coelestis but which modern nurseries offer as Felicia amelloides.

[Suburbangardener · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although this type of gardening is no longer practised in private gardens and it uses some out of date names, the concept is still valid and the ideas valuable if used on a small scale. For example, in discussing a "blue" garden, Jeckyll suggests that adding a bit of lemon yellow would make the blue pop more than a garden of nothing but blue flowers.

[Lydia · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started this thinking I would read all of Jekyll's books (many of them are fulltext on Google BookSearch), but then realized there isn't too much I can take away from her books. They are written like diaries, and don't really give much advice for growing in the Mediterranean climate. Thoughtful person.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love, love, love this book. Stays in a prominent place on our bookshelf.,.... wonderful read

[Audrey · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you have a good imagination for descriptions of scenery this might work for you. I do not, and got rather bored of reading descriptions of plantings and walkways. What few pictures there are are mostly black and white, or pictures of Jekyll-inspired plantings, and not the actual place she is writing about, which I am to understand no longer exists as it was. The writing is fine and somewhat better than average for garden books. It is somewhat light on advice or any practical detail, unless you aspire to copy her style of garden layout closely. As for general inspiration, I found little to go on here, but perhaps mostly because her style is not my favored style.

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can see why many consider this to be Jekyll's finest work. Although I didn't enjoy it as much as some of her other books, her views on colour and her suggestions for using it in garden design were (excuse the pun) groundbreaking for her day, and her work is still referenced by many garden designers today.

One of the things I love most about Jekyll is her single-minded determination to design the best possible garden she can, and her scorn for those who allow fancy design ideas to get in the way of good gardening. "It is a curious thing that people will sometimes spoil some garden project for the sake of a word. For instance, a blue garden, for beauty's sake, may be hungering for a group of white Lilies...but it is not allowed to have it because it is called the blue garden, and there must be no flowers in it but blue flowers. I can see no sense in this...Surely the business of a blue garden is to be beautiful as well as to be blue. My own idea is that it should be beautiful first, and then just as blue as may be consistent with its best possible beauty."

Although Jekyll helpfully provides advice on planting in pots, it's clear that the majority of this book is aimed at those with large gardens - "Ten acres is but a small area for a bit of woodland..." she claims, and later she advises leaving "anything from twenty-five to forty feet" between the woodland area and the main garden! She also assumes a small fruit garden will take up an acre and a half. Having said this, many of her planting plans could be easily adapted to much smaller gardens, and her general advise on plant combinations and colour schemes are relevant for any gardener.

I would recommend this book for keen gardeners and garden designers, but I think you do have to have a fairly good knowledge of common garden plants and their botanical names to really enjoy reading it, otherwise you will be having to stop every couple of sentences to look up a plant. If you are reading one of the older editions, you will also need to be aware that some plant names have now changed, such as Funkia now being Hosta and Megasea now Bergenia. My edition (Antique Collectors' Club 1982) has some colour photographs alongside Jekyll's original black and white ones, but I don't feel they add a great deal to the book, and it is particularly irritating when they are used to illustrated a quote about totally different plants (for example, an illustration of yellow broom and azalea is used to illustrate Jekyll's comments about white broom, purple iris and roses!) So if you can find one of the older editions, go for it; you won't be missing anything.

[Lanette · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was hard for me to understand why this is a 'classic' garden book. Her word descriptions did not translate into inspiration to me, partly because I was unfamiliar with a lot of the plants and partly because I'm a visual learner. What I did take from this book was to consider having a spring garden, a summer garden, a fall garden, etc rather that trying to have something in bloom everywhere in your garden at any given time.

[Michele Redman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jekyll is much admired for garden, color designs. And rightfully so. My gardens are ever evolving and she has inspiring ideas to try on a smaller scale