The Garden at Hidcote, By Fred Whitsey (Photos by Tony Lord)

(Tony Lord)

According to the late, great gardening writer Fred Whitsey, nothing has had a greater influence on garden design in the 20th century than Hidcote Manor Garden in the Cotswolds.

"It is the work of an artist using plants as his palette, the earth as his canvas," he explains in this authoritative and handsomely illustrated account of the life's work of the enigmatic First World War veteran and lord of the manor, Lawrence Johnston. It is "a gallery of plants...but also a textbook on garden making" and "a dream made reality".

Pictured above: fuchsias are among those plants brought from greenhouses to the red borders in the summer.