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George London and Henry Wise.
The Retir'd Gard'ner, in Two Volumes:...the Whole Revis'd, with Several Alterations and Additions, Which Render It Proper for Our English Culture.
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George London and Henry Wise.
The Retir'd Gard'ner, in Two Volumes:...the Whole Revis'd, with Several Alterations and Additions, Which Render It Proper for Our English Culture.
London: Printed for Jacob Tonson, 1706.
Acquired through the Robert L. Goldman Fund.
This is a generously illustrated translation of two French texts, François Gentil's Le jardinière solitaire and Louis Liger's Le jardinière fleuriste. The translators, London and Wise, were the best-known gardeners of their day in England and the last in the line of the great English formalists in garden design. George London along with three others founded the famed Brompton Park Nurseries in Kensington (where the South Kensington museums are now located); Wise was taken on as a partner about 1688. During the reign of William and Mary, London and Wise planted gardens at Chatsworth, Chelsea Hospital, and Castle Howard, among many other places, and both worked in the grounds of Kensington Palace on King William's mock fortifications in topiary. Formalism in English garden design was heavily influenced by French style, though always included characteristically English features, such as plain grass parterres with statues, popular in England since before the civil wars. London himself had enjoyed some training in France. These popular French treatises each went through several editions; a curious indication of their popularity in England lies in the fact that two di∂erent translations were published in London in the year 1706, this one by Jacob Tonson and another by his rival Benjamin Tooke.
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