Edith Wharton's Italian Gardens

by Vivian Russell (Photographer)

In 1903 Edith Wharton was commissioned by Century Magazine to write a series of articles on Italian villas and gardens. She gathered her household together and set off with her husband, her housekeeper and her small dogs on a four-month tour of Italy. Her articles were published in 1904 as Italian Villas and their Gardens . One of the first books to treat the subject of Italian garden architecture seriously, it influenced a generation of garden writers and landscape architects.

Nearly 100 years later, photographer and writer Vivian Russell set out on her own odyssey, following Edith Wharton's footsteps around Italy to photograph the best surviving gardens from her book and to tell the story of how each one was made. her lively text describes the patrons and architects who created the gardens and explores their hidden symbolic meaning.

Genres: Gardening, Travel, Italy

192 pages, Hardcover

First published September 26, 1997

About the author

Vivian Russell is a writer and photographer. She is American but has lived in England and France for most of her life. Her books include Gardens of the Riviera, Monet's Garden (which won the Garden Writers' Guild Award), Monet's Water Lilies, Monet's Landscapes, Edith Wharton's Italian Gardens and, most recently Dog Show. She was a regular contributor to Gardens Illustrated for many years and now writes and photographs for the Daily Telegraph gardening supplement.

Reviews

[Onceinabluemoon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Felt like I was holiday...

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

“The composition is simple . . . There is a quality of inevitableness about it ~ one feels of it, as of certain great verse, that it could not have been otherwise, that in Vasari’s happy phrase, it was born, not built.”

[Micebyliz]

i read this several years ago and check it out occasionally just to look at the beautiful photos.

[AskNezka · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fabulous tour of the gardens, many of them actually not thought much of by Wharton, so it is great to have the author's perspective on these amazing places.

[Mel · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow. Dreamiest gardens.. felt like I took a holiday whilst living in the pages.

[Marilyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't know how Edith Wharton went to Italy without visiting the Borghese Gardens in Rome.

[Caro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Skimmed, since we'll only see the Boboli Gardens, most likely. A whole different gardening style to fall in love with...