Here, in designs for more than 20 gardens, Penelope Hobhouse offers her knowledge as a designer, plantswoman and colourist, seeking to help readers to create their own successful gardens. Many of the designs are for urban sites - small town gardens in London and Surrey, a courtyard garden in Paris and a herb garden in New York. There is a widespread Scottish island garden, small country gardens in Somerset and Gloucestershire, planted cliff terraces, an outdoor dining room near Venice, a flower-clad pergola and a garden for vegetables in a rural setting. More ambitious schemes include an elegant formal garden for the Queen Mother, and Penelope Hobhouse's own garden, designed for low maintenance and flourishing on what was once unworkable Dorset clay.