The Spirited Garden

This photographer-author team sought out the most truly original gardens to feature here: those that exude personality quirks, use cleverly repurposed materials, and immediately reveal the owners' absolute obsessions with plants. Photographs by nationally published and Monrovia Nursery principal photographer Doreen Wynja celebrate handmade features like archways made of gnarled branches, sculptures made from found objects, and hand-welded fences. Accompanying descriptive texts by author and longtime Seattle Times gardening columnist Lorene Edwards Forkner work to bring the reader deep into the garden, shine light on what makes the owners feel compelled to continue developing their gardens' themes, and highlight their unusual or remarkable collections of plants and objects. The mix of high plant/horticultural knowledge and a love of artistically repurposed everyday materials as low-cost but unique features will strike a chord with all those who dream of upgrading their own gardens on a regular mortal's budget. Deep captions full of plant ID info bring the possibility home for readers to emulate planting designs and combinations that they see on the page.