Graham, Wade. American Eden: From Monticello to Central Park: What Our Gardens Tell Us About Who We Are.

HarperCollins. April 2011. c480p. bibliog.. illus. ISBN 978-0-06-158342-1. $35.00. Google eBook. $16.99. Kindle eBook. B004IWR37Y. $16.99.

In this publication, Graham (Bachelor of Arts, Comparative Literature, Columbia University; Master of Arts and Ph.D., U.S. History, University of California, Los Angeles; teacher of urban and environmental policy, School of Public Policy, Pepperdine University), a renown, Los Angeles- based garden designer, landscape architect, historian, writer, journalist, and environmental activist, presents a fascinating yet erudite history of American gardens. According to the author, for more than two hundred years, Americans have revealed themselves in their gardens, which have been rooted in time and place and have reflected our national spirit and concerns. To prove his thesis, Graham melds various methodological approaches, including biography, history, cultural commentary, literature, and horticultural studies, into a lengthy, discursive narrative, thereby resulting in a multivalent examination of American gardens and the people who have created them from the eighteenth century to the present. In seven chapters, Graham discusses what he considers to be the various types of American gardens in terms of broad historical categories: the Founding Gardens (1600-1826), parks and suburban gardens (1820-1890), Golden Age gardens (1880-1914), Arts and Crafts gardens (1850-1925), Californian gardens (1920-1960), post-modern gardens (1940s-2000), and contemporary gardens (2000- ). Within each era, he shows how the geometric and naturalistic aesthetic paradigms from the Renaissance and 18th century continued and were modified to suit the tastes of mostly wealthy and middle-class, American-born individuals, who sought to express themselves and their ideals through their gardens. Overall, Graham successfully distinguishes American gardens from their counterparts in other countries. While the author’s thesis that American gardens are unique yet reflective of various aesthetic, cultural, ethical, political, psychological, and social influences may not be entirely new, the original value of Graham’s text rests in its comprehensive, scholarly analysis of the subject and its vast, encyclopedic overview. Well-documented, with endnotes, a bibliography, and an index, this publication may need more reproductions (75 black-and-white reproductions and a 16- page color insert are included), to the extent that they further may illustrate and clarify the author’s main points for readers, who may get sidetracked by his approach. Enlightening, interesting, engaging, and accessibly-written, but not necessarily easy-to-follow, this foundational book, which serves as an intelligent guide to American gardens, will be of considerable interest to some garden lovers, students, scholars, professionals, and others. It is highly recommended for large public, academic, and special library collections. Uncorrected Proof. Availability: Amazon.com, Amazon Kindle eBook, Barnes & Noble.com,Google eBook

Toole, Robert M.. Landscape Gardens on the Hudson: a History.

Black Dome Press. 2010. c.192p. illus. bibliog.. index. ISBN 978-1-883789-68-8. $24.95.

In this generously- illustrated (over 140 reproductions) publication, Toole, a practicing landscape architect (1975- , private practice, Saratoga Springs, New York), who specializes in historic landscape study and restoration while also providing landscape design services on a variety of projects, retells for the first time the story of landscape gardening and architecture along the Hudson River during the “Romantic Age.” In fifteen chapters, each averaging eleven pages, Toole covers landscape gardening and architecture along the Hudson River from the end of the colonial era in the late eighteenth century until the last decades of the nineteenth century, a period during which American landscape gardening and architecture were born amidst the Nation’s quest to discover and sometimes assert its unique, cultural, political, and social identities amidst the natural resources and wonders of the American continent. In introductory chapters, the author sets forth the cultural, historical, and literary backgrounds as well as describes some early colonial gardens along the Hudson River, in order to distinguish them from later aesthetic and design components, influenced by but not limited to the Beautiful, Picturesque, and Gardenesque modes. Extensively referencing the writings and works of the landscape gardener Andrew Jackson Downing (1815- 1852) and the architect Alexander Jackson Davis (1803- 1892), both of whom figured prominently in the history of nineteenth- century landscape gardening, architecture, and design along the Hudson River and were notable for helping to establish the Picturesque mode of landscape gardening and architecture in the United States, he then examines specific Hudson River landscape gardens of the Romantic age, mainly focusing on those of Hyde Park, Montgomery Place, Blithewood, Sunnyside, Knoll (Lyndhurst), Millbrook, Kenwood, Locust Grove, Highland Gardens, Springside, Wilderstein, Idlewild, The Point, Wilderstein, and Olana. Not only does the author showcase the significant aspects of each garden’s design, layout, historic buildings, ornamentation, indigenous features, and plantings, but he also distinguishes each in terms of the various aesthetic ideals and influences that shaped its development. Including a list of illustrations, two appendices pertaining to visiting landscape gardens along the Hudson River and in England, endnotes, and a bibliographical essay, this publication is well-documented and thoughtfully- illustrated, with many historic images, not limited to ground plans, photographs, bird’s eye views, paintings, engravings, and other reproductions. Toole uses his own sketches and ground plans to further clarify and enhance the text, which is well- organized and fairly effectively written. Students, scholars, professionals, and some general readers interested in “touring” (Foreword by Elizabeth Barlow Rogers, p. vi) the showcased, historic gardens with Toole will be interested in reading this book. As the first comprehensive study of the Hudson River gardens of the Romantic age and their legacies, it constitutes an important, scholarly contribution to the study of garden history in the United States as well as a “feat of garden archaeology” (Foreword, p. vii), since many of the gardens do not exist any longer or are experienced in ways “at variance with the historic situation.” (p. 168). This publication is very highly recommended for large public, academic, and special library collections. Review copy. Availability: Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com