How to Design a Garden

A beautiful garden does not happen — it is designed, and the design decisions that determine what a garden can become are more consequential than any amount of subsequent care and maintenance. DK’s How to Design a Garden is the practical guide to making those decisions well: how to assess a space, understand its conditions, plan for year-round interest, create distinct areas within a larger garden, and translate a vision into a planting plan that will actually work.

The advice is practical throughout — grounded in real gardening experience rather than aspirational photography — and the visual examples show both successful designs and the common mistakes that undermine them. Coverage extends to gardens of every size, from small urban plots through suburban family gardens to larger landscape projects.

Essential reading for anyone embarking on a new garden or wishing to transform an existing one. Published by DK.