The Italian Formal Garden 



gardeners will undo their predecessors' work, and not a garden 

 looks in 1900 precisely as it did in 1600. One should also dis- 

 criminate carefully between the composition and the details of 

 a design, since one may be excellent and the other very infe- 

 rior. There is no one recipe or model for the Italian garden ; 

 differences of site and size and environment have resulted in a 

 marvelous variety of actual designs, in spite of the uniformity 

 of their controlling elements, and the problem of any given 



AN APPROACH AND ENVIRONMENT FOR THE PALACE" 



Rear of Pitti Palace 



Boboli Gardens 



site offers the widest opportunity for variety both of scheme 

 and of detail, and for the exercise of good taste and discrimi- 

 nation. No formula can take the place of good taste. 



V. 



A few words are now in order as to the location of the 

 most important examples of this art. They are naturally to be 

 found in greatest number in or near Rome, the seat of the lux- 



52 



