The Harrowsmith Annual Garden

Pleasance Crawford, a Canadian landscape and garden history researcher
and writer, is the editor of Landscape Architectural Review.

Annual gardens can be as small as a container or as large as a meadow.
Loosely defined, they flourish and fade within a single growing season.
These qualities make them ideal for gardeners who move frequently, or
for gardeners who want to change their gardens frequently.

In preparing this book, the authors (Bennett is Harrowsmith’s
gardening editor; Forsyth, a photographer and long-time gardener) delved
into the horticultural history of many species and cultivars. They
experimented with familiar and unusual annuals and with tender
perennials—combining them in imaginative ways, photographing them at
their prime, and reflecting on their possibilities.

The book’s early chapters cover sowing and growing. The next three
group annuals by height. The final six group them by other qualities:
attractive foliage, tolerance of sun or shade, fragrance, and usefulness
in fresh and dried arrangements.

This is an attractive and appealing book. Its enthusiastic
descriptions, definitive photographs, and sound cultural advice may
inspire many jaded growers of common annuals—and perennials—to order
new seed, grow new seedlings, and plant new gardens.