The Natural Style in Landscape Gardening 



conventionalized group form. An examination of 

 any large number of planting plans will indicate 

 how easy it is to fall into some set form of grouping 

 and how very, very hard it is to learn that infinite 

 variety which so bountifully blesses the works of 

 Nature. I have often been especially impressed 

 with the structural stupidity of the ordinary plan 

 for an herbaceous border. It consists of a crazy 

 patchwork of irregular spots of approximately the 

 same size. The finished border cannot be anything 

 except a sample book of the nurseryman's ma- 

 terials. 



Now the remedies for this are three. Simplifica- 

 tion changing to a much simpler geometric pat- 

 tern; dominance the selecting of one or two spe- 

 cies which shall be placed in so large a majority as 

 to control the whole; pictorial instead of horticul- 

 tural treatment making of the border a unified 

 picture instead of a collection of miscellaneous gar- 

 den plants, however pretty and pleasing they may 

 be. 



All these faults of grouping have one basis in 

 common. They all result in part from the perni- 



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