A beautiful Australian gardening book that also acts as a botanical field guide, artist’s folio, and practical philosophy of cultivation.

Within, words and pictures that help you how to notice shade, texture, failure, seasonality, patience, and the personalities of plants that try and hide themselves. Law-Smith focuses on unusual plants, old roses, lilies, woodland varieties, ground covers, and what she calls “the pranks of nature.” There’s a strong Australian sensibility running underneath it too: gardening not as English pastoral fantasy, but as adaptation to local conditions, harshness, climate, and experimentation.

The illustrations are extraordinary. Full-page botanical paintings throughout, delicate without feeling ornamental or decorative-for-decoration’s-sake. 

1983 first edition published by the Women’s Committee of the National Trust of Australia (Victoria). Hardcover in very good condition with light shelf wear and clean internal pages.