Overview

Something is blooming every day of the year in the renowned gardens at Montrose, Nancy Goodwin's nineteenth-century estate in historic Hillsborough, North Carolina. Since moving to Montrose with her husband in 1977, Goodwin has transformed more than twenty acres into an extraordinary complex of interlocking gardens that come in and out of focus as the seasons overlap and change. Beautifully written and illustrated, Montrose: Life in a Garden is Goodwin's affectionate biography of her gardens, recounting how and why each section was developed over the years, including the Dianthus Walk, Nandina Land, Hellebore Slope, Mother-in-Law Walk, Snowdrop Woods, and Jo's Bed. It is also a meticulous month-by-month chronicle of a specific year in these gardens--a year that saw a punishing drought that threatened Goodwin's no-irrigation policy, a damaging December ice storm, and the beginnings of a plan to preserve Montrose in the future. Working on her knees for long days throughout the year, Nancy Goodwin always has a vision of how her gardens will appear in twelve months or in twelve years.She will spend weeks, for instance, planting hundreds of snow drops along a woodsy path in order to enjoy a fleeting week of exquisite beauty in coming years. She never puts anything into the ground without imagining what form, colour, and texture it will add to a bed. With tireless patience and unflagging optimism, Goodwin will wait years to see a single plant bloom. Following Goodwin's activities throughout the year, readers will learn the fundamentals of maintaining a four-season garden in Zone 7 in the South. Award-winning garden illustrator Ippy Patterson has provided more than 160 lavish illustrations of the gardens at Montrose and these meticulously detailed drawings appear throughout the book. Nancy Goodwin has written for Fine Gardening, American Gardener, Horticulture, Veranda, Country Home Country Gardens, and other magazines. She is a co-author of A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin and Allen Lacy and co-editor of A Rock Garden in the South, by Elizabeth Lawrence, also published by Duke University Press. From 1984 to 1993, she operated Montrose Nursery, which specialized in unusual perennials, including hellebores and cyclamen.Ippy Patterson has illustrated garden columns for the New York Times, the Hartford Courant, McCall's Magazine, and Country Living Gardener Magazine. She has illustrated numerous books, including An Elizabethan Bestiary: Retold, 100 Flowers and How They Got Their Names, and No Bones, for which she won the National Academy of Sciences Illustration Award in 1990.

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9780822336044

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Reviews

Montrose: Life in a Garden is a beautifully written account of the joys and trials of gardening through all four seasons in a demanding climate; but even more, it illuminates a life's work that draws on the deepest levels of creative imagination. Nancy Goodwin likens the evolution of her garden to the unfolding of a visual symphony-a living and constantly changing composition that has grown seamlessly from her richly textured life at Montrose. Her descriptions of work in the garden and her vivid plant portraits are sympathetically enhanced by Ippy Patterson's lovely illustrations. -May Brawley Hill, author of Grandmother's Garden: The Old-Fashioned American Garden, 1865-1915 and On Foreign Soil: American Gardeners Abroad A beautiful book about a beautiful garden. -Michael Pollan, author of The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World A hybrid between a botany intensive and an internship with one of the most accomplished gardeners in the country, this journal is like being at Nancy Goodwin's elbow-seeing through her eyes, learning, digging deeper, discovering. And strengthening the illusion of kneeling beside the Master, Ippy Patterson's illustrations give the text a magical clarity that's almost as good as growing those hellebores yourself. -Tovah Martin, author of Tasha Tudor's Garden Nancy Goodwin's Montrose: Life in a Garden will inspire other gardeners to follow their life's passion. Her chronicle of a year in the garden reminds us that a keen eye for plants, attachment to place, and tolerance for hard work are what make exceptional gardens. Woven throughout her discerning plant descriptions and Ippy Patterson's graceful illustrations is a clear dedication to seeing Montrose continue as a garden long into the future. -Bill Noble, Director of Preservation Projects, The Garden Conservancy The list of people who make beautiful gardens, and then afterward write beautifully about them, is very short. Through this book, Nancy Goodwin's Montrose will be a speaking garden forever, and her flowers-many of them among the rarest things gardeners can grow-are preserved in the achingly lovely images of Ippy Patterson, where they will always remain fresh and fine. How fortunate we are that this wonderful book now joins the short list of books about great gardens, written by their makers. -Wayne Winterrowd, author of Annuals and Tender Plants for North American Gardens [E]ngaging ... reads like a memoir of a year in the life of Nancy Goodwin's 20-acre North Carolina garden... [A] triumph. -- Barbara Pleasant, The American Gardener This lovely little book, exquisitely illustrated with a friend's penciled and watercolored botanical drawings, chronicles a year in her garden. It's a story of the seasons, the weather, hard work, triumphs, and disappointments. Goodwin's voice, precise and detailed when discussing the differences between various hellebores and snowdrops, remains fondly appreciative of the treasures she grows so lovingly and well. The book is a meditation on the continuity of gardening in one place for more than a quarter century, a life that allows for holding the garden past and present in mind while always imagining next season, and the next. -- Valerie Easton, Horticulture In the transformation of the more than 20 acres of her historic property, Montrose, in Hillsborough, N.C., accomplished gardener Nancy Goodwin does her work on her knees, hands in the soil, instead of by plans and drawings. But Ippy Patterson has done the drawing, bringing Goodwin's wondrous gardens to life with her stunning illustrations of the plant life found there. Together, they show how Goodwin has carefully and diligently created a masterpiece of life, month by month, seed by seed. -- Globe and Mail Montrose is one of America's favourite gardens and Nancy Goodwin is one of its favourite gardeners... Being in the company of Goodwin ... is a pleasure. With each of her chapters named for a month, she treats us to a dazzling display of seasonally performing plants, celebrating their shapes, colours, habits and botanical intimacies. Equally beguiling are Ippy Patterson's complementary drawings of individual species. -- Alexander Urquhart, Times Literary Supplement While reading Goodwin's book you'll feel as if you're walking by her side in the garden, month by month, through the years... So vivid and detailed is her writing that you'll easily fall in love with her favorites, and appreciate her knowledge of nature's endless miracles and her tolerance of its changes and challenges. Further, Ippy Patterson's delicate pencil-and-watercolor illustrations appearing on almost every page thoroughly enrich and enliven this story. -- Carolina Gardener

A beautiful book about a beautiful garden. --Michael Pollan, author of The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World Nancy Goodwin's Montrose: Life in a Garden will inspire other gardeners to follow their life's passion. Her chronicle of a year in the garden reminds us that a keen eye for plants, attachment to place and tolerance for hard work are what make exceptional gardens. Woven throughout her discerning plant descriptions and Ippy Patterson's graceful illustrations is a clear dedication to seeing Montrose continue as a garden long into the future. --Bill Noble, Director of Preservation Projects, The Garden Conservancy Montrose: Life in a Garden is a beautifully written account of the joys and trials of gardening through all four seasons in a demanding climate; but even more, it illuminates a life's work that draws on the deepest levels of creative imagination. Nancy Goodwin likens the evolution of her garden to the unfolding of a visual symphony--a living and constantly changing composition that has grown seamlessly from her richly textured life at Montrose. Her descriptions of work in the garden and her vivid plant portraits are sympathetically enhanced by Ippy Patterson's lovely watercolour illustrations. --May Brawley Hill, author of Grandmother's Garden and On Foreign Soil: American Gardeners Abroad The list of people who make beautiful gardens, and then afterward write beautifully about them, is very short. Through this book, Nancy Goodwin's Montrose will be a speaking garden forever, and her flowers--many of them among the rarest things gardeners can grow--are preserved in the achingly lovely images of Ippy Patterson, where they will always remain fresh and fine. How fortunate we are that this wonderful book now joins the short list of books about great gardens, written by their makers. --Wayne Winterrowd, author of Annuals and Tender Plants for North American Gardens A hybrid between a botany intensive and an internship with one of the most accomplished gardeners in the country, this journal is like being at Nancy Goodwin's elbow--seeing through her eyes, learning, digging deeper, discovering. And strengthening the illusion of kneeling beside the Master, Ippy Patterson's illustrations give the text a magical clarity that's almost as good as growing those hellebores yourself. --Tovah Martin, author of Tasha Tudor's Garden ... Montrose is one of America's most revered gardens and Nancy Goodwin is one of its favorite gardeners... with this memorable, beautifully presented account of a gardening year, [Goodwin] has secured a place for herself among the handful of gardener-writers who excel in both arts. --Times Literary Supplement, May 5 2006

Author Information

Nancy Goodwin has written for Fine Gardening, American Gardener, Horticulture, Veranda, Country Home Country Gardens, and other magazines. She is a coauthor of A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin and Allen Lacy and coeditor of A Rock Garden in the South, by Elizabeth Lawrence, also published by Duke University Press. From 1984 to 1993, she operated Montrose Nursery, which specialized in unusual perennials, including hellebores and cyclamen. Ippy Patterson has illustrated garden columns for the New York Times, the Hartford Courant, McCall’s Magazine, and Country Living Gardener Magazine. She has illustrated numerous books, including An Elizabethan Bestiary: Retold, 100 Flowers and How They Got Their Names, and No Bones, for which she won the National Academy of Sciences Illustration Award in 1990. Nancy Goodwin has written for Fine Gardening, American Gardener, Horticulture, Veranda, Country Home Country Gardens, and other magazines. She is a coauthor of A Year in Our Gardens: Letters by Nancy Goodwin and Allen Lacy and coeditor of A Rock Garden in the South, by Elizabeth Lawrence, also published by Duke University Press. From 1984 to 1993, she operated Montrose Nursery, which specialized in unusual perennials, including hellebores and cyclamen. Ippy Patterson has illustrated garden columns for the New York Times, the Hartford Courant, McCall’s Magazine, and Country Living Gardener Magazine. She has illustrated numerous books, including An Elizabethan Bestiary: Retold, 100 Flowers and How They Got Their Names, and No Bones, for which she won the National Academy of Sciences Illustration Award in 1990.

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