Claude Monet spent the last 43 years of his long life at Giverny creating the beautiful gardens: the most famous in France and one of the most visited in the world. Garden historian and designer Caroline Holmes explores Monet's twin passions -painting and plants - and looks at his intelligent approach to creating a personal paradise of lily ponds and kaleidoscopic colour. This beautiful book shows the artist as a consummate plantsman who composed his gardens with an Impressionist's care for colour and form, later to be reinterpreted into paintings of beautiful abstraction. Drawing upon Monet's own voice and those of his contemporaries and offering a wealth of horticultural detail, this book provides fascinating insight into his obsessional love of gardening and painting.