Daily Archives: April 2, 2014

Link Focus: Book Review: The Gardens of Venice and the Veneto from The Patient Gardener’s Weblog

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Book Review: The Gardens of Venice and the Veneto from The Patient Gardener’s Weblog

The best book reviews give us a clear indication why we should read a book, its pros, its cons, its faults and its triumphs. Even more, it should entice us to read the book on our own, unsatisfied with the small glimpse we have been given in the review. We should want more.  Helen at The Patient Gardener’s Weblog provides this an more. She details how this book addresses not only the garden of Venice themselves but also the history that surrounds them and their creation.

Since we have visited Italy (mainly Sicily) several times in the past, I am naturally attracted to anything Italian. Combine that with my interest and gardening and you have book that was sure to attract my attention. Helen’s review only makes me want to read it all the more. If you have a similar combination of interests, I think you will find it engaging, too.

Gardens venice

From The Patient Gardener’s Weblog…

As a bit of an Italophile I was more than happy to receive a review copy of The Gardens of Venice and the Veneto by Jenny Condie. However, I did wonder if this book would have a limited market being about gardens in such a small specific area.

The book, on first glance, is your archetypal coffee table book. Large, relatively heavy and full of sumptuous photographs by Alex Ramsay. Unsurprisingly, given the location of the gardens the images groan with parterres, clipped hedges, citrus plants, statutes and the lovely pale coloured Italian villas. However, and it is a very significant however, the text that accompanies the photographs takes this book away from your average illustrated book of nice garden views.

Previously on Link Focus:

Link Focus is a series that comments on some of the links I share on my social media accounts and here on the web site. To get these links as I find them, subscribe to me on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and elsewhere. Also look for the “My Favorite Things” posts that appear regularly in the blog. These include collections of links for each calendar month.

Get new shared links as I find them via my social media feeds:

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Interesting Plant: Red Stick Dogwood (Cornus alba ‘Sibirica’)

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Red Stick Dogwood (Cornus alba ‘Sibirica’)

Who doesn’t love a splash of red in the garden, especially during those long Winter months. Much like the red cardinal on the white show, this dogwood would look dazzling on a sunny, snow-covered day in the garden.

Red stick dogwood

Discovered via Pinterest User, Dave Scholten

Cornus alba (red-barked, white or Siberian dogwood) is a species of flowering plant in the family Cornaceae, native to Siberia, northern China and Korea. It is a large suckering shrub that can be grown as a small tree. As a popular ornamental used in landscaping its notable features include the red stems in fall (autumn) through late winter, the brightest winter bark of any cornus;[1] and the variegated foliage in somecultivars, such as C. alba ‘elegantissima’, in which the discreet flat whitish flower clusters are almost lost in the variegated texture and dappled light. C. alba can grow to 3 m (10 ft) high, but variegated forms are less vigorous. For the brightest winter bark, young shoots are encouraged by cutting to the ground some older stems at the end of the winter, before leaves are open.

The plant is extremely hardy, to USDA Zone 3.

The following cultivars have gained the Royal Horticultural Society‘s Award of Garden Merit:-

  • ‘Aurea’[2] (yellow leaves)
  • ‘Elegantissima’[3] (deep red stems and small white flowers)
  • ‘Sibirica’[4] (2.5 m (8 ft 2 in), brilliant red stems, cream flowers)
  • ‘Spaethii’[5] (variegated leaves with yellow margins)

      — Wikipedia.org

 
More information on Red Stick Dogwood (Cornus alba):

Previously in the Interesting Plant series: 

Interesting Plant is a series from A Gardener’s Notebook blog and podcast that highlights the most interesting plants I find in my Internet and real-world travels — Douglas

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