English Cottage Gardening for American Gardeners by Margaret Hensel,1992

Loving the style of English Cottage gardening with its wonderful examples in jolly old England, I picked up this book with eagerness, heightened by the fact that Tasha Tudor wrote the foreword. If one is unfamiliar with her “Corgi Cottage” garden, it is a delightful example of cottage gardening that truly pictures what is possible for that sort of landscape… with all the old fashioned lifestyle that Tasha Tudor is also famous for, in life and art.

I think that the “for American Gardeners” part of the title is a misnomer, unless it refers only to the zones that mimic English climate such as the Northern coastal regions of the West Coast and the lower New England and Mid Atlantic states on the East Coast. A good half of the book showcases gardens situated in England, which is good for educational purposes in style, but holds drawbacks for the American gardener.

A few of the reasons:

• we have a lack of ancient stone walls and enclosures here- which give these gardens so much of their charm
• CLIMATE, need I say more?
• the rustic architecture of the homes is rare in America, and this is no small matter in the success of the beautiful melding of home and garden in Cottage gardening of England

That is not to say we can’t have our own interpretation, but the book doesn’t provide much guidance in making that interpretation.