Proven Winners Garden Book: Simple Plans, Picture-Perfect Plants and Expert Advice for Creating a Gorgeous Garden

by Ruth Rogers Clausen

[annieb123]

Originally published on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

The Proven Winners Garden Book is a garden design and tutorial book from plant breeders and suppliers, Proven Winners. In the springtime all of the big box stores and a fair number of independent retailers sell bedding packs and flats of plants for home gardeners to take home and set out in their gardens and containers. In North America, a large proportion of these are from Proven Winners.

Due out 19th Feb 2019 from Timber Press, it's 188 pages and will be available in paperback and ebook formats.

This is an appealing and well photographed book. There is inspiration to be found here. I liked a lot of the container plantings especially. These designs and combinations utilize easily sourced plants so readers can get -exactly- the pictured result with -exactly- the same plants as pictured. For readers who are bewildered about what to plant and what plants (and colors) to combine to get an effect which won't startle or offend the neighbors/housing association, this book has some good answers.

People spend a fortune and a lot of time on their gardens. This book will get new suburban gardeners up to speed relatively painlessly and without panic.

This is definitely written with the new gardener in mind. Experienced gardeners who are used to spending a month or more sequestered with the new seed catalogues in the depth of winter probably aren't going to have any epiphanies over this book. There's enough basic info here to get started. The authors have covered designing with and planting bedding packs from their own brand. There's a lot of emphasis on spot planting containers and coordinated plantings. The plantings are decorative. There's no discussion on edible plantings or xeriscaping. Vegetables are not covered.

There is a resource listing (for NA gardeners), a bibliography, and an index.

Three stars, probably four+ for people who want to buy packs of plants, plant them in their balcony window boxes and get a consistent result without a lot of effort or expense.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.