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HANDBOOKS OF PRACTICAL GARDENING—XXV
EDITED BY HARRY ROBERTS
THE BOOK OF GARDEN DESIGN
[Illustration: LAWN AND SHADE]
THE BOOK OF
GARDEN DESIGN
BY
CHARLES THONGER
AUTHOR OF “THE BOOK OF GARDEN FURNITURE”
“A garden is a beautiful book, writ by the finger of God; every
flower and every leaf is a letter. You have only to learn them—and he
is a poor dunce that cannot, if he will, do that—to learn them and to
join them, and then to go on reading and reading, and you will find
yourself carried away from the earth to the skies by the beautiful
story you are going through.”—DOUGLAS JERROLD.
JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD
LONDON AND NEW YORK. MCMV
_Turnbull & Spears, Printers, Edinburgh._
PREFACE.
The whole subject of Garden Design is so diverse and complicated that
I must be pardoned for disclaiming any ideas of completeness for this
small and unpretending book. To refer, however briefly, to the methods
of different workers, and the varied effects obtained by them; or to
present in detail the many phases of garden making as practised in
England to-day, would necessitate not one volume, but several.
If the reader’s object in perusing these pages is to find a model or
plan which he may slavishly duplicate in his own garden, he will, I am
afraid, search in vain. Garden “design” is not of necessity formal,
and suggestive though the name may be of set patterns and geometrical
figures, more may be learnt concerning it in the woods and meadows of
Nature than in all the musty volumes which line the shelves of the
professional’s office. The pleasures of garden making are so real that
each one should jealously guard for himself the privilege of being his
own designer.
It is with the idea of helping the novice to help himself that I ask
his acceptance of whatever may be of value to him in “The Book of
Garden Design.”
C. T.
WOODBRIDGE, SUFFOLK, _May 1904_.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
PREFACE v
I. OF GARDENS AND GARDEN DESIGNERS 1
Nature’s Gardens—Qualifications necessary for the Designer—“Garden
Architects”—Formal Gardens, Old and Modern—“Capability
Brown”—Repton—Artificial and Natural Design—Uselessness of Stock
Plans and Patterns.
II. GENERAL PRINCIPLES 12
Comfort and Convenience the Primary Essentials—Undue Complexity
to be avoided—Variety Desirable—Garden Paths—Eccentricity
Condemned—Attempting too much—Colour and Contrast.
III. THE SELECTION OF A SITE 21
Accessibility—Approach—Soils—Aspect—Altitude—Shelter—
Surroundings—Outlines of Property—Existing Timber to be retained.
IV. WALKS AND LAWNS 30
Carriage Drives to be Direct—Walks for Different Parts of the
Garden—Serpentine Paths—Edging—Value of Lawns—Breadth and Space
conveyed.
V. FORMAL AND LANDSCAPE PLANTING 37
Avenues often Pretentious—Objections to Clipped Yew
Hedges—Topiary—Flower Walks—The Maze—Natural Planting—Boundary
Plantations—Specimen Trees—Grouping.
VI. KITCHEN-GARDEN AND ORCHARD 44
Unfounded Prejudice against Kitchen-Gardens—Site—Aspect—Boundaries—
Borders—Good Walks a Necessity—Water-Supply—Fruit Plantations—
The Orchard Beautiful.
VII. THE TREATMENT OF WATER 52
Value of Water in the Garden Scene—Artificial Treatment—Natural
Effects generally Preferred—Running Water—Planting on the
Margin—Banks.
VIII. HARDY HERBACEOUS PERENNIALS 60
Importance of Living Plants to Design—Border Plants with Various
Coloured Flowers.
IX. PLANTS FOR ALPINE, AQUATIC, AND BOG GARDENS 69
Alpines, with Blue, Pink, Yellow, and White Flowers—Water
Plants—Suitable Subjects for Marshy Margins—Bog Plants.
X. FLOWERING TREES AND SHRUBS 74
Evergreens Overplanted—Deciduous Trees—List of Varieties.
XI. HARDY CLIMBERS 83
Climbers on Trees—Roses, Clematis, and other Desirable Subjects.
INDEX 89
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
LAWN AND SHADE _Frontispiece_
TERRACE CLIMBERS 16
A PAVED WALK 32
SUNDIAL IN GARDEN WALK 40
STREAM AND WOODLAND 54
HERBACEOUS GROUPING 64
A LILY TANK 70
A GARDEN HOUSE 76
_Photographs by F. Mason Good._
THE BOOK OF GARDEN DESIGN
CHAPTER I
OF GARDENS AND GARDEN DESIGNERS
From the earliest times the garden has been regarded as a fitting
adjunct to the dwelling-places of man. The very name seems to suggest
a place of beauty and repose, where the fairest of fruits and flowers
are collected into a small compass for our special pleasure and
edification. The term “garden,” too, is often employed in a broader
sense, meaning a tract of country, so lavishly endowed with natural
beauties, as to almost suggest that it is the special property and
care of some master hand, who cultivates his broad acres where we
are content with inches. Eden, where, according to Milton’s famous
description in “Paradise Lost,” the “cedar and pine and fir and
branching palm,” mingled together in a tangle of sylvan loveliness, was
a garden of Nature. We speak of Italy as the “garden” of the world, and
are accustomed to attribute the same term to some specially favoured
district or locality in each county at home. From each of these all
suggestion of design is absent; a mightier hand than ours has planted
their groves, watered their fertile valleys, and strewn the meadows
and hedgerows with flowers. To these favoured spots of earth, those
at any rate which are left us, the garden designer must cast his eye,
as he sets out to learn the rudiments of his craft. Not that garden
making consists in the endeavour to duplicate a whole landscape on a
small scale—this was an error into which Brown’s followers blindly
fell—but because so much that is of value to us may be gathered from
an intelligent study of the means by which Nature achieves her most
beautiful effects. The disposition of wood and water in a stretch of
well-balanced scenery, the beautifully proportioned effect of level
and rising ground, of valleys and hills; all these afford an object
lesson, which, at some time or other, is bound to prove suggestive when
endeavouring to forecast results in artificially arranged grounds.
Nature, then, is the school where the novice should go to be thoroughly
taught the rudiments of his art. Not only will he learn much that is
not to be found in books, but his love of the picturesque and beautiful
will be fostered and encouraged—a necessary proceeding if he is to
achieve any measure of success as a maker of gardens.
To a certain extent the good designer is born not made, but much may
be done by intelligent study and a real fondness for the work, to make
up for any lack of natural ability in this direction. But in order to
plan a really satisfactory garden, one qualification is absolutely
essential: before all things the designer must be himself a gardener.
That is, he must have spent some portion of his life actually working
among the flowers and trees, whose suitable arrangement he afterwards
proposes to decide. He must have sown and planted with his own hand,
watched the growth of leaf and bud, and observed the habit of each
plant and its adaptability to certain situations. Colour effects must
also be noted, in short, nothing should be allowed to escape his eye
which concerns the varied phases in the life of the simplest of the
garden trees and flowers. Here lies the secret of half the failures
which have occurred since garden making came to be regarded as
something more than mere haphazard treatment of a piece of enclosed
ground. Its votaries have many of them been men who knew absolutely
nothing of the ways of flowers, to whom the wonders of nature were
as a sealed book. That they were clever draughtsmen none will deny,
and that many beautiful gardens were made on paper is equally to
be admitted. But that was all, they were unable to see how their
gardens would look after being planted a few years—probably they did
not care, at any rate they were miserable failures, as must ever be
the case when a well drawn design is considered sufficient proof of
supreme ability. This class of garden maker is by no means extinct
to-day, and with paper, drawing appliances, and a few books of plans
for guidance, is able to turn out sketches which, to the uninitiated,
seem to suggest unlimited acquaintance with the subject. But transfer
these designs to the ground, lay out the paths and beds as he suggests,
plant trees and raise mounds, dig watercourses and build rockeries to
satisfy his caprice, and what do we find? Our garden is a wretched
affair, a thoughtless jumble of half-matured ideas, a desecration of
common-sense and good taste. Trees are planted where their graceful
outline is cramped and hidden, flowering plants have no possible chance
of displaying their full beauty before us, and everywhere we look there
are signs of ignorance and wasted opportunity. There is something so
contradictory in the term “garden architect”; it suggest the union of
two totally distinct professions. Bricks and mortar, cut stonework
and terracing, are now pushed into the garden, with the result that
its real object is lost and its beauties crowded out. The architect
is greedy; not content with designing the house and its approaches,
its stabling and many accessories, he must needs take the garden in
hand also, and we find his work everywhere and weary of its endless
repetition. But we have brought it on ourselves, and must either rest
content with that we know to be false, or make an effort to free
ourselves from this meretricious form of art without further delay.
All may not possess the faculty for suggesting a complicated plan for
themselves, but there are few who may not study the outlines of the
subject, so that they may be better able to control those whom they
employ. After all, the garden should reflect the ideas and taste of
the owner, not of the professional. The art of garden making consists
very largely in the exercise of common-sense and a due perception of
the fitness of things. These, coupled with a love for flowers and a
knowledge of their requirements, will lead the beginner to success far
more quickly than any ability he may possess for map and plan drawing.
The formal garden, as it existed in the days before its modern
substitute cast a slur on the word “formality,” reflected no small
credit on the skill and taste of its originators. There was a sense of
breadth and stateliness about it which is sadly lacking in its modern
rival. Especially praiseworthy were the open stretches of turf, and
bold grouping of trees, which were characteristic of the time. The
planting of avenues, to whose beauty many of our older houses owe so
much, the alleys and greens bounded with hedges of clipped yew, and
the wide borders filled with herbaceous flowers, were all pleasing in
spite of their stiffness. Aided by handsome terraces, used only where
needed, as at Haddon and other places, these old time gardens were
free from any suggestion of trickery or deception. Their designers
were men whose ideas, if a trifle austere, were perfectly honest; they
liked their handiwork to display its beauties in a straightforward
manner, with the consequence that their gardens were well-proportioned,
and clearly betokened that money had been ungrudgingly spent where
necessary. The modern formal garden is of quite another stamp, with its
flimsily-constructed terraces, its ill-designed vases and statuary.
There is a certain straining after effect noticeable, and a lack of
dignity displayed, which makes this latter a very feeble imitation of
its prototype. How can a modern villa be expected to act as a suitable
foil to a style of garden design which is a cheap adaptation of that
practised at Versailles or Chatsworth?
But, leaving the formal garden for a moment, and passing to a
consideration of that which was the outcome of an entirely different
set of ideas. The landscape school of designers believed that severity
and stiffness were totally out of place in a garden, and the only way
to secure artistic and beautiful effects was to go direct to Nature
for a model. This was right in so far as it went; it became ridiculous
when carried to extremes. If “Capability Brown,” himself the most
noted member of the new school, and his followers had been content to
study Nature, gathering thus many valuable lessons, and then being
content to adapt them to the altered conditions which the nature of
a garden imposed, much good might have resulted. But instead, their
great ambition was to stifle any ideas they might have on the subject,
and become slavish imitators, trying to reproduce a whole landscape
within the small limits of the garden boundaries. Brown was hailed
as a genius, and his advice requisitioned in the remodelling of many
of England’s best gardens. All traces of formality were swept away,
the terraces, stately parterres, yew hedges, and regular-shaped beds
were abolished, and the ground laid out on entirely new lines. This
consisted in the introduction of miniature mountains, streams and
torrents, the latter crossed by bridges; the remaking of paths, so
that they wound in serpentine curves, entailing needless labour to
traverse. At Blenheim, Brown turned a river into a valley, with such
effect that he is said to have proudly declared “the Thames would never
forgive him.” He abhorred avenues, and this style of planting gave
place under his rule to the irregular dotting of belts and clumps at
varying intervals over an estate. There is no doubt but that some of
the “follies” of his satellites were wrongly attributed to him, but, in
spite of this, Brown was a consummate mannerist, and undoubtedly was
the means of spoiling many a good garden by his efforts at deceptive
planting and arrangement.
After Brown’s death in 1784, Humphry Repton was considered the
leading garden designer for many years. To him we owe the origin of
the term “landscape gardener,” a name chosen to designate a science
which combined the united resources of the landscape painter and the
practical gardener. Repton is entitled to our respect, in that his
schemes were not directed towards the sweeping away of old gardens,
but rather to increase, if possible, their beauty and attractiveness.
He considered himself a disciple of Brown, but on examination of his
methods and work, we are led to conclude that he differed from him in
many material particulars. Brown would not tolerate formality in any
shape or form, but Repton, realising that few extremes are pleasing,
preferred to strike a mean, and combine the ideas of the early
designers with those of his predecessor. Thus, whilst duly appreciating
the charms of a garden laid out with proper regard to natural effect,
he wisely saw that it was ridiculous to attempt to bring this style
to the very doors of the house. Architectural features do not readily
combine with those of the field and moorland. Hence we find that
gardens designed by him were somewhat severe in treatment close to
the house, gradually merging into a freer and more natural style, as
the work of the builder and mason was left behind. Thus, by slow
gradations, the most formal design was merged without incongruity into
the wild and uncultivated landscape which bordered the property. Repton
also made a number of sketches in connection with his work, tending to
show how the general appearance of his garden would change from time to
time, as the trees grew and the idea of newness disappeared. Though we
cannot agree with many of the rules laid down by him for the benefit
of future workers, there is much to admire in his methods of garden
planning and arrangement. If he cannot be considered as the inventor of
any marked and novel departure (the “gardenesque” style excepted), at
any rate he did nothing to spoil existing gardens by the introduction
of foolish innovations, which was the fault of many who went before
him. Where his ideas on garden planning must be considered as at
total variance with our own was in the banishing of many necessary
conveniences, simply because they did not happen to be ornamental
or harmonise exactly with the landscape. A garden is a place of
pleasure and recreation, and there can be no possible harm in erecting
comfortable summer houses, seats and resting places, from which to view
its beauties, even though these are not to be found in natural scenery
of the ideal type.
But the examination in detail of the idiosyncrasies of each and every
garden designer would be, to say the least of it, a proceeding which
could do no good, and might be productive of much harm. The novice,
seeking for assistance and advice, will be needlessly confused by any
lengthened reference to the various “styles” laid down as correct by
individuals of widely differing tastes and ideas. After all, when we
have laboriously studied the art of garden making in this and other
countries as it existed over a number of years, and have nodded
approval at the work of a certain exponent, only to find later that
our ideas are more in accord with those of his successor, what do
we find? That the greater part of what we have read is calculated to
perplex rather than help, and in the end leave us no whit better able
to form opinions as to the right and wrong way of setting about our
own business. Putting aside all minor considerations, and looking at
the matter in the broadest and simplest light, there are, and have
been from time immemorial, but two styles of garden design. On the
one hand, we have the artificial, on the other, the natural. The
first is generally the offspring of the professional designer, the
paper planner, the lover of architectural features, the supporter
of the makers of fountains, terracing and statuary. The second can
in its truest form emanate only from the garden lover, the man who
grows flowers and trees for the sake of their individual beauty, and
strives with the materials which Nature lavishly supplies, to make a
picturesque and beautiful enclosure near his dwelling. From this it
must not be inferred that architectural adornments are wrong, or that
a garden can be made in any situation without their aid. The contrary
is the case. On a sloping hillside, a garden may only be possible by
the aid of terracing: an uninteresting corner may be redeemed by a
well-placed sundial or statue: a simple fountain, with the music of
its falling water, may by its presence give pleasure during the long
summer days. But in spite of all, architectural features must ever be
the exception, not the rule, in the well ordered garden, and it is only
when they are really needed to further our scheme of “lawn and tree,
flower and shrub deftly interwoven,” that there is the slightest excuse
for introducing them.
There can be nothing more distressing to the garden artist than
the idea of making gardens to a stock plan. We are not dealing in
wall-papers, ornamental tiles or mosaic work when we undertake the
laying out of a garden; to this day there are many who think that the
business, if business it may be called, can be conducted by post.
Surely, they argue, the professional, if he knows anything at all,
will have no difficulty in advising without the trouble and expense of
a visit. Given the dimensions of a plot of ground, what can be easier
than to make a plan on paper showing the positions to be occupied by
lawns, shrubberies, flower beds and walks? Alas, this is how hundreds
of gardens _are_ made, and the same wretched designs are dumped about
the country like so many copies of a popular picture. A quotation from
the writings of Batty Langley will show that the man who relies on
plans is depending for guidance on a sadly broken reed. He says:—“Now,
as the Beauty of Gardens in general depends upon an elegant Disposition
of all their Parts, which cannot be determined without a perfect
Knowledge of its several Ascendings, Descendings, Views, etc., how is
it possible that any Person can make a good Design for any Garden whose
Situation they never saw? To draw a beautiful, regular Draught is not
to the Purpose: for altho’ it makes a handsome Figure on the paper,
yet it has quite a different Effect when executed on the ground.”
Individuals must necessarily have their peculiarities, and it is right
they should: we recognise the same qualities, perhaps some trick of
light and shade, in a score of totally different subjects painted by a
great artist. But there is no excuse for the designer who, having laid
out one garden to his satisfaction, immediately proceeds to imitate his
previous effort in a dozen different places. Because a terrace happens
to look well in a hillside garden, there is no reason for supposing
that its inclusion is desirable in one situated on the level. Yet how
many tons of earth have been carted from one place to another, so that
stupid embankments might be raised, and afterwards fortified with
terraces—all this in places where there was not a hill for miles. Love
of imitation has been the downfall of many an otherwise good designer,
whose enthusiasm for the work of others has completely over-ruled his
own common-sense. We are not even meant to imitate Nature, the best of
teachers, but rather look to her for inspiration, adapting the lessons
learnt in meadow and woodland to the altered conditions which highly
cultivated ground imposes.
Nothing to my mind can be less helpful to the garden maker than the
common practice which prevails of instituting competitions in the
horticultural papers, with prizes for the best garden design sent in.
As an encouragement in the art of draughtsmanship, or a stimulus to
the beginner to use his ingenuity, this form of plan drawing may prove
decidedly beneficial. But to imagine that the designs themselves are
of the slightest practical use is, in the majority of cases, absurd.
An attractive plan, mechanically adaptable to gardens of varying
sizes, is the greatest temptation which can be set in the path of the
unwary. It teaches men to grub about the earth with measuring rod and
chain, levelling, filling up hollows, cutting down trees, so that no
obstruction may be offered to the carrying out of the design in its
entirety. Whereas all our thoughts should be for the natural appearance
of the ground, its slopes and gradients, which harmonise perfectly with
the face of the surrounding country. Existing features should in nearly
all cases be retained, or simply modified to our purpose. Imagine the
wantonness of cutting down a beautiful tree, because our plan says that
a path ought to run where it now stands; or what possible excuse can
there be for ruining a stretch of fine turf with beds cut in the form
of circles, lozenges and triangles. The moral of all this is plain.
Each garden must be treated, as regards its laying out, simply and
solely on its own merits and possibilities. It matters not whether we
are dealing with a humble quarter acre attached to the modern villa, or
have in hand the broad surroundings of the country mansion. There is
no rule-of-thumb method for either; each is worthy of just as much love
and care as might be bestowed were it the only garden in the world.
Sedding says, “A garden is man’s report of Earth at her best,” which,
whatever else it may imply, surely suggests that our best work, and
our noblest conceptions of the beautiful, must be pressed into service
if we are to effect any real improvement. Set styles, and the whims
and caprices of the individual, live but a short time; they are here
to-day, but to-morrow their very name is forgotten. The next generation
will probably eye with disfavour much of the garden work which is now
regarded with so much satisfaction. But there can be no reproaches for
the man who has worked honestly, endeavoured to penetrate the hidden
ways of Nature, and trusted in his own common-sense and reason to point
out the best course. The love of flowers and trees for their own sake,
and not because it is fashionable, is the same in every age, and that
form of garden design only is right which is founded first and foremost
on the study of Nature and Nature’s laws.