Outside the Bungalow: America's Arts and Crafts Garden

The bungalows that the gardens surround range from the archetypal dark, timbered wood and stone to the rustic, grand, and even Southwestern, offering a visual feast of gardens to match. The authors emphasize not specific plants, but the architectural elements and style of such gardens: tiled fountains, pergolas, pathways, and the use of stone, timbers, and courtyards to tie house and garden together.

Both text and photos focus in on details like outdoor light fixtures, hose bibs, mailboxes, birdhouses, fences and lattice as part of the characteristic Arts & Crafts aesthetic. The "Garden Portraits" chapter includes garden plans as well as photos of bungalow exteriors from Seattle to southern California, emphasizing that it is not the plants themselves but how they are grouped to emphasize the architecture and the hardscaping that creates an Arts & Crafts garden. Still, there are certain plants that appear over and over again in the photos, and have the right look for such gardens--ornamental grasses, vines, climbing roses, and plants with bold structural foliage like iris, ferns, clivia, and hosta. The charming chapter on potting sheds and tree houses, as well as the exuberant and colorful plantings throughout, go a long way toward explaining why people have been so captivated by "bungalowmania" for more than three decades. --Valerie Easton

Book Description
This third volume in a popular series highlights the special beauty and enduring appeal of Arts and Crafts bungalow gardens.

Matching Paul Duchscherer's authoritative text with striking photographs by Douglas Keister--the team that made The Bungalow and Inside the Bungalow so successful--Outside the Bungalow will captivate the ever-growing number of Arts and Crafts aficionados. In it the garden, with its "nature-friendly" charm and character, takes the spotlight as an integral part of bungalow living.

Focusing on the fixed architectural or "hardscape" elements, striking ensembles include entry gates, arbors, portals, and driveways; wooden fences, screens, railings, and masonry walls; paths, walkways, and steps; ponds, fountains, bird baths, swimming pools, and spas; courtyards, patios, gazebos, pergolas, and porches; outdoor furniture from benches to swings; and details from treehouses and potting sheds to lighting and garden accessories. Special chapters feature gardens of the famous Charles and Henry Greene houses, and a turn-of-the-century plant list. Portraits of gardens in context with their vintage bungalows range from glorious color photographs to hand-colored postcards of the period and will thrill architecture or design professionals and amateurs eager to recapture the romance of "bungalowmania."