Beautiful at All Seasons

Beautiful at All Seasons

Southern Gardening and Beyond with Elizabeth Lawrence

  • Autor: Lawrence, Elizabeth; Armstrong, Ann L.; Wilson, Lindie
  • Editor: Duke University Press
  • ISBN: 9780822338871
  • eISBN Pdf: 9780822389767
  • Lloc de publicació:  Durham , United States
  • Any de publicació digital: 2007
  • Mes: Febrer
  • Pàgines: 264
  • DDC: 635.0975
  • Idioma: Anglés
Elizabeth Lawrence (1904–85) is recognized as one of America’s most important gardeners and garden writers. In 1957, Lawrence began a weekly column for the Charlotte Observer, blending gardening lore and horticultural expertise gained from her own gardens in Raleigh and Charlotte, North Carolina, and from her many gardener friends. This book presents 132 of her beloved columns. Never before published in book form, they were chosen from the more than 700 pieces that she wrote for the Observer over fourteen years.

Lawrence exchanged plants and gardening tips with everyone from southern “farm ladies” trading bulbs in garden bulletins to prominent regional gardeners. She corresponded with nursery owners, everyday backyard gardeners, and literary luminaries such as Katharine White and Eudora Welty. Her books, including A Southern Garden, The Little Bulbs, and Gardens in Winter, inspired several generations of gardeners in the South and beyond.

The columns in this volume cover specific plants, such as sweet peas, hellebores, peonies, and the bamboo growing outside her living-room window, as well as broader topics including the usefulness of vines, the importance of daily pruning, and organic gardening. Like all of Lawrence’s writing, these columns are peppered with references to conversations with neighbors and quotations from poetry, mythology, and correspondence. They brim with knowledge gained from a lifetime of experimenting in her gardens, from her visits to other gardens, and from her extensive reading.

Lawrence once wrote, “Dirty fingernails are not the only requirement for growing plants. One must be as willing to study as to dig, for a knowledge of plants is acquired as much from books as from experience.” As inspiring today as when they first appeared in the Charlotte Observer, the columns collected in Beautiful at All Seasons showcase not only Lawrence’s vast knowledge but also her intimate, conversational writing style and her lifelong celebration of gardens and gardening.

  • Contents
  • Acknowledgments
  • Introduction
  • Note to the Reader
  • One. Seasonal Flowers
    • Garden Resolutions
    • Flowers for Christmas Time
    • Flowers Greet the New Year
    • Winter Flowers
    • The Green Winter
    • A Hard Winter
    • Bamboo
    • Storm Damage
    • The Merry Month of May
    • Tender Perennials for Hot-Weather Gardens
    • Flowers in the Fall Border
    • Fragrance in the Garden
    • Fall Additions to the Border
    • Sow Hardy Annual Seeds During September
    • Planting Annuals in Autumn
    • Late-Blooming Flowers
    • The Gardening Year Is Just Beginning
  • Two. Perennials and Annuals
    • Planting in Relays
    • Badge of Gardening Includes Black Knees
    • Gardening Surprises
    • The Law of Supply and Demand
    • Variegated Foliage
    • Selections for the Rock Garden
    • Tropical Plants
    • Annuals
    • Sweet Peas
    • Peony
    • Tree Peonies and Others
    • Clematis also Flowers in Shade
    • Beautiful Lilies
    • Asteromoea mongolica—Kalimeris pinnatifida
    • Hellebores
    • The Christmas Rose and Other Hellebores
    • Giridlian . . . A Master of Plants
    • Night-Blooming Cereus
    • The Dividends of Fall Planting
    • Savannah Lands of East Carolina
    • Petasites
  • Three. Bulbs, Corms, and Tubers
    • Planting Bulbs, Corms, and Tubers
    • Bulbs Through the Seasons
    • Some Early Spring Bulbs
    • Daffodils Need Early Start
    • Specialty Bulbs
    • Crown Imperials
    • Lycoris radiata
    • Amaryllis Family
    • The Surprise Lily
    • Lilies Grow Where None Were
    • Garden Casualties
  • Four. Trees and Shrubs
    • Planting for Ice Storms
    • Plants for Parking Strips
    • Flowering Trees for the City
    • Street Trees
    • Trees with Colored Bark
    • Witch Hazels
    • Flowering Cherries
    • Serviceberries and Sloes
    • Dogwoods
    • Buckeyes
    • Eucalyptus
    • Honey Locust
    • Osmanthus
    • Hollies
    • Conifers
    • Firs and Cedars
    • Flowering Shrubs
    • March-Flowering Shrubs
    • Viburnums and Other Flowering Shrubs
    • June-Flowering Shrubs
    • Viburnums
    • Pyracanthas
    • Nandinas
    • Hydrangeas
    • Sasanquas
    • Camellia saluenensis
  • E. A. Bowles’s Lunatics
  • Five. Vegetables and Herbs, Climbers and Creepers
    • Fall Vegetables
    • Two Vegetable Gardens
    • Mrs. Hobbs and Her Herbs
    • Sweet Woodruff
    • Dandelions
    • Vines Are Useful Tools
    • Smilax
    • Clematis Hybrids
    • Akebia and Rosa banksiae
    • Ground Covers
    • Ground Covers Pose Problems
    • Tiny Creepers
  • Six. Gardeners and Gardens
    • Wing Haven
    • Importance of Garden Details
    • Steps in Your Garden
    • Walks and Paths
    • Terraces and Patios
    • Water in the Garden
    • Mr. Krippendorf ’s Garden
    • Physic Garden at the Country Doctor Museum
    • Mr. Busbee’s Garden
    • A Visit to Italy’s Oldest Botanic Garden
    • Colette ’s Mother’s Garden
    • The Splendor of Royal Gardens
    • Gotelli’s Collection of Dwarf Conifers
    • The Scented Garden
    • The Gardens of a Soldier’s Wife
    • Pioneer Seedsmen
    • Young Belgian Guided Southern Horticulture
    • Meet Caroline Dormon
    • She Talks to the Birds
    • The Hunt Arboretum
  • Seven. Gods, Legends, and Rituals
    • The Gods of the Garden
    • The Ash, a Symbol in History
    • The Tale of the Magical Hawthorn Tree
    • The Holy Thorn Blooms for Royalty
    • The Christian Year Parallels the Garden Year
    • Holiday Wreaths
    • The Advent Wreath
    • Legend and Lore of the Christmas Tree
    • International Christmas Trees
    • The Flowers of the Trinity
    • The Flowers of Passiontide
    • The Story of the Passion Flower
    • Rituals of the Palms
    • Rogation Days—The Blessing of the Crops
  • Eight. Bits and Pieces
    • Asafetida
    • Feeding the Birds
    • Honey
    • Organic Gardening
    • Pruning
    • Pruning Should Be Done Every Day
    • Historic Flower Arrangements
    • Bouquet Carried Messages
    • Pomanders
    • Creatures Add to a Garden
  • Index