Faced with a new garden many people have visions of an instant Ground Force makeover. But where to begin? How to avoid costly mistakes? This attractively presented book attempts to offer advice from the basics to the more complex design projects. Divided into 5 simple stages, author Joanna Smith explains how to assess your new plot, how to add instant interest cheaply, how to plan for the future and how to carry out the work itself. Colour photographs and illustrations throughout display innovative ideas to translate into your own plans and key bullet points focus the mind on the more pertinent facts. An eye on the pursestrings is an underlying factor ensuring the projects embarked on do not go to waste in later years but add a mature background for more expensive projects to be carried out when funds are more readily available. Ending on a series of evolving designs of 7 differently styled gardens, this is a book for beginner gardeners, those faced with a new home and only a builder's dumping ground for a garden and, aware the house itself will be taking up most of any spare funds, Joanna's aim is to show how cheaply the bones of an attractive garden can be laid. - Lucy Watson
