The most comprehensive, up-to-date, and lavish guide to garden plants available today, this extensive encyclopedia includes over 8,000 plants, 4,000 of which are featured in exquisite full-color photographs. Written by a team of plant experts, this superb book is designed to be the gardener's bible, a standard work of reference for every gardening bookshelf. It is oganized into the following sections:

Creating a Garden This is a simple guide to garden planning by John Brooks, the world-renowned landscape designer. Choice of plants in relation to garden style, scale, and proportion, and use of color and texture are all explained and illustrated with a host of gardens. Extensive lists suggest plants for particular sites.

The Plant Catalog Organized in a unique, easy-to-use format, this section is arranged by plant type, size, season of interest, and color of flower or foliage. Over 4,000 plants are individually described, each with its own full-color photograph, symbols indicating cultivation requirements, hardiness zone numbers, and, for trees and shrubs, a scale drawing of mature size and shape.

The Plant Dictionary a complete A-Z guide to more than 8,000 plants, this section also functions as an index to the encyclopedia. It describes every genus in the book and provides information about thousands of other recommended plants.

Plus a complete index of over 2,500 common names for easy cross-reference and a glossary of straightforward definitions of the technical terms used in this book.

If they can afford it, libraries should have both editions of this invaluable one-volume reference. For gardeners seeking the right plant for the right place but with no knowledge of the specific name, the 1989 title arranges its catalog of 8000 plants not alphabetically by name but by season and color. It starts with color photos and descriptions of large trees, separating them by seasonal interest and by color within each season. It does the same for smaller trees, then for shrubs, climbers, perennials, annuals, rock plants, bulbs, and succulents. Expanding its coverage to over 15,000 plants, the 1997 encyclopedia is organized alphabetically, making it an ideal reference for patrons who want to know what a particular plant looks like, how it grows, and its hardiness zones. Its descriptions of popular plant species, like Narcissus, Primula, and Rhododendron, are a real strength.
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