Frank and Marjorie Lawley have spent almost 40 years at Herterton House, a 16th century farmhouse on the Wallington Estate, near Cambo (birthplace of Capability Brown) in Northumberland. When they leased Herterton from the National Trust in 1976, the Lawleys took on a series of derelict farm buildings. This highly original and personal book describes in detail how, with patience and passion, they restored Herterton House and created an exquisite and unique garden. As well as discussing the practicalities involved, it also describes the influences and the lifetime of thinking behind their achievement. Within its mere acre, the garden at Herterton House provides more visual interest and more interesting plants (plants you can also buy from its small nursery) than many gardens twenty times its size. It also stimulates visitors to think about what plants to use and how to use them, about the history of English gardens, about the relation of the past to the present and about the relation of a garden to the landscape around it. This stunning book records and celebrates Frank and Marjorie's achievement over four decades at Herterton House. With photographs by Val Corbett and an introduction by Charles Quest-Ritson.

"A brilliantly readable account of double flowers, exploring everything from their many varieties to their biological development, their long history in our gardens and the powerful emotional responses they elicit. This supremely researched book will leave you appreciating double flowers as never before." - Stephen Blackmore, Queen's Botanist and former Regius Keeper of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh With charms extending from the romantic allure of double roses and the attention-grabbing flamboyance of double tulips to the exquisite perfection of tiny double primroses, double flowers are among the most loved of our garden plants. Double Flowers is the first popular handbook to explore them in depth. Double flowers are simply flowers with a greater than normal number of petals or petal-like structures. They occur spontaneously in the wild and can also be selected and bred. This superbly illustrated guide - begun by bestselling garden writer Nicola Ferguson before her death in 2007, and completed by Charles Quest-Ritson - celebrates some of the many thousands of beautiful double flowers produced throughout history. The book examines how doubles have arisen; how they are constructed; how and where they will flourish; their particular appeal and how best to place them in the garden; and the advantages and disadvantages of such flowers - for gardeners, for flower-arrangers and for wildlife.