Vita Sackville-West Archives

March 9, 2022 William Cobbett, Wilhelm Pfeffer, Karl Foerster, Vita Sackville-West, The Art of Edible Flowers by Rebecca Sullivan, and Luis Barragán

Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart Support The Daily Gardener Buy Me A Coffee Connect for FREE! The Friday Newsletter | Daily Gardener Community Friends of the Garden Meeting in Athens, Georgia Register Here Historical Events 1763 Birth of William Cobbett, English writer, Member of Parliament, and…

March 9, 2021 See America’s Top Spring Gardens, Karl Foerster, Vita Sackville-West, Gardener’s Latin, Flower Confidential by Amy Stewart and Berton Braley’s Botany Poem

Today we celebrate an East German Nurseryman and plant breeder who is remembered in the name Feather Reed Grass. We’ll also learn about an exceptional English author and garden designer. We hear a little snippet about Gardener’s Latin as a clue to the meaning behind Plant Names. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a fantastic…

February 26, 2021 How to use More Foliage in the Garden, Anna Eliza Reed Woodcock, Alfred D. Robinson, The Tussie-Mussie, Fantastic Fungi by Paul Stamets, and a Botanical Dream for Balboa Park

Today we celebrate a charming woman who became known as the Apple Blossom Lady. We’ll also learn about the man who raised the best begonias in the world back in the early 1900s. We hear some thoughts on tussie-mussies. We Grow That Garden Library™ with an informative and delightful book about Fungi (“funj-eye”) – and…

February 19, 2021 A Wild Spring Plant Display, The Orchid Thief, Charles Swingle, Growing Algerian Iris, Embroidered Ground by Page Dickey, and Strange Embroidery with Botanist Eliza Brightwen

Today we look back at the story that inspired the book The Orchid Thief. We’ll also learn about the incredible true story of a Madagascar explorer. We hear words about the incredible Algerian Iris. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a memoir from a garden who pulls back the row cover on the remarkable story…

Gardeners Know Better

by Vita Sackville-West If it is true that one of the greatest pleasures of gardening lies in looking forward, then the planning of next year’s beds and borders must be one of the most agreeable occupations in the gardener’s calendar. This should make October and November particularly pleasant months, for then we may begin to…

November 24, 2020 The Zen Garden Chaise Lounge, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Charles Darwin, Arlington Heights Garden Club, Vita Sackville West, The Beautiful Edible Garden by Leslie Bennett and Stefani Bittner, and Mosquitoes in November

Today we celebrate a prolific writer who loved violets and wrote about a secret garden. We’ll also learn about the best-selling book that hit bookstores today back in 1859, and it changed the world forever. We’ll look back at some timeless garden advice from 1966 courtesy of the Arlington Heights Garden Club. We’ll hear some…

November 3, 2020 William Cullen Bryant, Clarence Elliott, Robert Frost, Six Seasons by Joshua McFadden, and Golden Squash Soup

Today we celebrate the American Romantic poet who wrote: “The rose that lives its little hour is prized beyond the sculptured flower…” We’ll also learn about the man who made Six Hills Nursery famous. We hear some words about autumn by an American Poet Laureate. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a book that rocked the…

When To Sow

by Vita Sackville-West When skies are gentle, breezes bland. When loam that’s warm within the hand Falls friable between the tines. Sow hollyhocks and columbines. The tufted pansy, and the tall Snapdragon in the broken wall. Not for this summer, but for next. Since foresight is the gardener’s text. And though his eyes may never…

February 19, 2020 Making a Bean Teepee, Protecting Mature Trees, Charles de l’Écluse, Daniel Solander, William Francis Ganong, Winter Bee Poetry, Gardens in Detail by Emma Reuss, 4-Tier Mini Greenhouse and Frances Perry

Today we celebrate the man who introduced tulips to Holland and the botanist who was supposed to become Carl Linnaeus’s son-in-law — but didn’t. We’ll also learn about the botanist who loved New Brunswick. Today’s Unearthed Words feature words about winter – and bees in winter. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a book that…

February 13, 2020 North Carolina Wildflower of the Year, Vita Sackville-West, Joseph Banks, Lewis David von Schweinitz, Jeremiah Bailey, Julia Dorr, A Sting in the Tale by Dave Goulson, and Maria L Owen

Today we celebrate the botanist who sailed with Captain James Cook on the Endeavor and the man regarded as the father of North American mycology. We’ll learn about the man who patented the first practical lawnmower 198 years ago today. Today’s Unearthed Words feature a poet and writer who used the names Flora or Florilla…

January 27, 2020 Butterfly Symmetry as Camouflage, The Love of Peat, Karl Wilhelm von Baden-Durlach, Samuel Palmer, Lewis Carroll, the National Geographic Society, the Humboldt Botanical Garden, Sissinghurst by Vita Sackville-West and Sarah Raven, Stylus 10 Pack, and Terramycin

Today we celebrate the King whose dream castle incorporated 1,200 varieties of tulips and the man who is regarded as the greatest channeler of the English rural landscape. We’ll learn about the mathematician who wrote a book inspired by the Oxford Botanic Garden and the relatively young Botanic Garden that was started in the 90s…

January 16, 2020 Planting Hope, Marks Hall Arboretum, Antonio José Cavanilles, Wine Bricks, Carole Lombard, Louisa Yeomans King, January Poems, Murder Most Florid by Mark Spencer, Tree Branch Hooks, and Lengthening Days by Vita Sackville-West

Today we celebrate the Spanish Enlightenment priest and botanist who named the Dahlia and the glamorous movie star who traded in her star sapphire collection for a tractor. We’ll learn about the item vintners were selling during prohibition and the woman who became the most widely read American Garden author in the United States. Today’s…

November 21, 2019 Dancing with Bees, the Garden Works in Winter, Jan Gronovius, Albert Burrage, Harold Nicolson, A Potted History of Vegetables by Lorraine Harrison, Tchotchke Tidy Up, and the First Garden TV Show

Today we celebrate the botanist who named the very first plant for his mentor Carl Linnaeus, and we celebrate the 160th birthday of one of the country’s wealthiest orchidologists and the founder of the American Orchid Society. We’ll hear some garden poetry on leaves and November. We Grow That Garden Library with a book from one of…

The Herbaceous Peony is the Very Epitome of June

by Vita Sackville-West It always seemed to me that the herbaceous peony is the very epitome of June. Larger than any rose, it has something of the cabbage rose’s voluminous quality; and when it finally drops from the vase, it sheds its petticoats with a bump on the table, all in an intact heap, much…