The Cutting Garden

Few things are more beautiful than a bouquet of flowers, and growing and cutting your own adds immeasureably to the pleasure a bouquet brings. In this book, illustrated with 50 inspiring color photographs, the gardener's cut-flower season extends from late winter, with shrubs and trees to force indoors, through the spring and summer flowers—bulbs, annuals, perennials—the "everlastings" you can grow for winter's dried flower bouquets. Especially valuable are the sections on when and how to cut flowers, how to condition them, and suggestions on combining different flowers into carefree arrangements. The basic mechanics of flower arranging and photos of home-grown bouquets will encourage novice gardeners.

Rob Proctor is a prolific author, illustrator, photographer, and lecturer—as well as a columnist for the Denver Post and an instructor at the Denver Botanic Gardens. He lives in Denver, Colorado.