| This is a book for people who love plants. In particular, it is a book for people who love woody plantstrees, shrubs and vines. In the pages of this book you will find a seasonal series of woody plant portraits, a garden gallery of old friends and new acquaintances, including many unusual plants. Each portrait will extol the virtues of a plant, give cultural and propagation information, and offer advice on creative ways to use the plant in your garden. The array of plants described includes 150 wonderful woodies: a range of plants that offer unique garden character, and among which are plants useful for gardens in diverse areas. |
| This collection of plant portraits has been gathered from a weekly series of plant portraits I wrote as individual press releases while I worked at the North Carolina State University Arboretum in Raleigh, North Carolina, from 19901993. The weekly press releases, featuring a different plant each week, were designed to focus attention on plants of promise at the NCSU Arboretum currently new to, or underutilized by, the gardening public. The press release program was the brainchild of Catherine Knes-Maxwell, the Arboretum's development directora good friend to both plants and plant-people. |
| Each of these plant portraits was written as I fell in love with a given plant, usually during the season of year in which the plant was at its bestbut don't be surprised to find an evergreen juniper described in summer and deciduous alders chosen for winter. Woody plants are four-season plants with characteristics of interest year-roundand there was no predicting which plant I might fall in love with at any given time of the year. |
| The choice of which plant to describe each week was purely a matter of my personal obsession that week. As a result, the plants covered in this book are a unique collection of woody plants that range from commonly available but often overlooked selections, to rare exotics coveted by collectors, to fantastic finds brand new to horticulture. There is, however, one common thread throughout: all of these plants are "good garden plants"; i.e., they are especially appealing, relatively trouble-free, and reliable in a range of landscape conditions. |
| These plant portraits were written for a broad audience of gardeners and growers, hobbyists and homeowners, and horticulturists, professional and otherwise, of all shapes and sizes. As a result, the language is not highly technical, but the critical information you'll need is there to successfully grow, and garden with, these plants. |
| I have tried to share my sense of the diverse beauty and irreplaceable magic that these woody plants bring to the world. I hope this book will entice you to grow themit is, after all, a book for people who love plants. |
 | | BY KIM E. TRIPP |
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