Each one is worth buying gardening book on this list twice – once for a gift and once for keeping yourself.
Or you can sneak in a read discreetly before gift-wrapping it.
Gardening books in 2023 are no longer divided into ‘practical’ and ‘inspirational’.
Practical books are now beautifully made manuals. They have textured covers, elegant photographs and contemporary illustrations, printed on satisfyingly thick paper. A good example is No Dig by Charles Dowding.
Inspirational books now combine growing care instructions with lavish bespoke photography in glorious colours. For example, Lilacs by Naomi Slade, with photography by Georgianna Lane, could sit on any well-appointed coffee table. However, it also has all the information you need to choose and grow lilacs.
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What is the best gardening book for beginners?
This is probably the most frequently asked question. First, consider the lifestyle and goals of the novice gardener.
For example, Jack Wallington’s Greener Life would start a new town or city gardener with excellent gardening habits. This book contains good practical advice on how to garden. It also offers a contemporary, relaxed take on how to treat your garden as part of your lifestyle rather than something completely separate. A ‘greener’ element is lightly woven in, combining a personal story with good wildlife, soil care advice and garden design.
A Greener Life isn’t just a book about gardening—it’s also a personal memoir and a blueprint for garden design.
What to Sow, Grow and Do by Benjamin Pope is another brilliant gardening book that will give novice gardeners all the information they need. It is well structured, with a list of gardening terms at the beginning. Thoughtfully written and comprehensive, it features atmospheric photography by Kim Lightbody.
Probably the best gardening book for beginners.
What is the best book for growing vegetables?
Grow your own gardening today is growing for food in harmony with nature. It’s no longer about endlessly trying to control it.
Charles Dowding’s No Dig revolutionized gardening.
Charles Dowding’s No Dig is a comprehensive explanation of how to grow more crops with less effort. The key is to preserve your soil structure. The Vegetable Grower’s Handbook by Huw Richards is based on the principles of permaculture. It is also a good practical, well laid out manual for anyone who wants to grow food.
The Vegetable Grower’s Handbook by Huw Richard is a comprehensive guide to growing fruit and vegetables in harmony with nature.
Both books are clear, well written and contain all the details you need to grow vegetables successfully. And both writers experiment with ‘breaking the rules’ of growing vegetables to find easier, more productive ways to grow them. Buy any. Or both.
The best gardening books for small gardens and pots
If the would-be vegetable grower is short on space, then Mark Ridsdill-Smith’s Vertical Guide to Container Gardening Vegetables is a must. It won the Garden Media Guild Practical Book of the Year 2022. Subtitled ‘how to grow an abundance of herbs, vegetables and fruit in small spaces’, it is part of the hugely successful Vertical Veg blog.
If you want a flash of flowers in a small space, then Arthur Parkinson’s The Flower Yard is one of the garden book successes of recent years. Arthur Parkinson is a young horticulturist who trained at Kew Gardens and filled his own small garden with an abundance of potted flowers.
And Bloom Publishers have produced a collection of small, beautiful gardening books by top gardening experts. Try pots – fill your containers with plants, attend to their needs, watch them bloom by Harriet Rycroft. For years she was in charge of displaying pots at Whichford Pottery and is a keen pot grower. Over the years, she’s found that some pot growing tips are unnecessary. So while she promises ‘not to oversimplify things’, she focuses on what she found to be working.
Harriet Rycroft’s Pot Growing Tips are the result of 30 years of growing in containers, both at home and at work.
Good gardening books for toddlers or kindergarteners
Get kids interested in gardening by introducing them to Willsow Plantable Books. These are colorful picture books about vegetables, such as Basil that built bridges or Lettuce that wanted a new look. Each book has real seeds, so you can grow your own basil, carrots or lettuce. I first saw them at the Dan Cooper Garden.
He also offers The Little Growers Cookbook with a range of gardening and cooking activities to do with children.
The best book on indoor gardening
The Plant Savior by Sarah Gerrard Jones is billed as ‘the book your houseplants want you to read.’ It is a ‘handy kit’ on how to choose and care for indoor plants. It also aims to help eradicate the idea of houseplants as a quick buy – they often die and are soon replaced. Just a few tweaks, she says, can “help your houseplants not only survive but thrive.” And that means you won’t have to go out and buy more.
The best book on eco-gardening
All the books on this list have eco-friendly gardening at their heart. Next year, this will be an even more important topic, and the Society of Garden Designers and the RHS are making sustainable gardening a priority.
For those who want concrete instructions on how to achieve a better, more environmentally conscious garden, Stephanie Rose’s Regenerative Garden is the go-to manual. The subtitle is ’80 practical projects to create a self-sustaining garden ecosystem.’ Some books gloss over key instructions, but this one is clear and to the point. Learn how to build a rain garden, self-watering planter, giant bed, potted watering system, food forest, and more.
Some organic gardening books emphasize practicality, but The Regenerative Garden provides practical, step-by-step instructions.
If you want to inspire someone to walk on the wild side of gardening, check out Stephanie Mahon’s Wild Gardens. This wonderful book tells how wilderness and gardens have gone hand in hand throughout history. It’s meticulously researched and combines very enjoyable storytelling with how you create your own wild garden.
Stephanie Mahon’s Wild Gardens won Garden Book of the Year at the 2022 Garden Media Guild Awards.
The best book for flower lovers
Flower on the Day by Miranda Janatka is both a pleasant read and full of interesting facts about flowers. Discover the botanical history and legends of the flower and what people have used it for over the centuries. Did you know that magnolias date back to the age of the dinosaurs, for example? This isn’t a gardening how-to book, but Miranda is a Kew-trained horticulturist, so she knows her plants and weaves fascinating stories around them.
The best book for garden trees
The premise of RHS A Tree in My Garden by Kate Bradbury is that if you plant just one tree in your garden, you can have an incredibly positive effect on the environment. She explains the science behind it. And the book features 50 species of trees to help you choose the right tree for your garden, covering its appearance, care needs and the wildlife it supports. It is both a useful reference and a fascinating read.
The best gardening book for renters
Lockdown has taught us that even if you’ve only been in your garden for a year or so, it’s still a necessary space. Matthew Pottage wrote How to Garden When You Rent. The subtitle is ‘Make it yours, keep your landlord happy’, which summarizes the key elements. He points out that even if you have to leave a few plants behind, you’ll learn about gardening and create a space you can enjoy more. Most of the garden is in pots, which you can take with you. A must for anyone who wants a garden but doesn’t think it’s worth the investment of time and effort if renting.
Best for garden visitors
South East England has some of the most famous gardens in the world, such as Great Dixter and Gravetye Manor. It also has a wealth of private gardens, many of which are of historical interest. Barbara Segall followed The Secret Gardens of East Anglia with The Secret Gardens of the South East. It’s a tour of the lesser-known gardens of Kent, Surrey and Sussex, often referred to as the “Garden of England”. The book features beautiful photographs and expert insights from one of Britain’s most experienced garden writers.
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