Please direct comments,
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Louisiana Gardens
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FAX: (504)368-1195
Featured Garden
About the Book
About the Author
Louisiana: Gardens & Getaways
Weekend Getaways in Louisiana
Featured Garden
About the Book
About the Author
Louisiana: Gardens & Getaways
Weekend Getaways in Louisiana
Breathtakingly beautiful photographs combine with equally vibrant text to present twenty-nine of the Pelican State's most famous gardens.
Louisiana's traditional gardens, plantation gardens, arboretums, parks, commemorative areas, and nature preserves will awe and inspire gardners. Helpful maps direct readers to every azalea, camelia, and magnolia from Afton Villa Gardens in St. Francisville to Zemurray Gardens in Loranger.
Author Mary Fonseca is a freelance writer who actively promotes touring Louisiana to various travel groups, clubs and organizations. She is the author of Weekend Getaways in Louisiana ($14.95 pb), also published by Pelican.
Author's Hometown: New Orleans, LouisianaAward-winning architectural photographer Steven Brooke is the author of Seaside ($29.95hc/$19.95pb) and The Majesty of Natchez and coauthor of The Gardens of Florida ($29.95hc/$19.95 pb), all published by Pelican.
Photographer's Hometown: Miami, Florida128 pp. 11 x 8 1/2 132 color photos 2maps Biblio.
ISBN: 1-56554-305-X $29.95 hc
ISBN: 1-56554-306-8 $19.95 pb
MAY 1999
REVIEWS
Review from Southern Living magazine
June 2000 issue
BAYOU BLOOMS
Now you can traipse through 29 Bayou State gardens in just a few hours, with a little imagination and a beautiful new book, Louisiana Gardens. No matter what the weather or the blooming schedule, you can view these serene spots at their peak anytime on an armchair tour.
Photographer Stephen Brooke (who has also done the popular works Seaside and The Majesty of Natchez) takes you visually through the state's green treasures while author Mary Fonseca (Weekend Getaways in Louisiana) tells their stories. His images and her words bring you close to these gardens, just short of being able to smell and touch their wonders. If you're inspired to complete your experience in person, each garden is open to the public. Maps lead you to them.
In 128 pages, you'll glimpse grand Spanish moss beards in live oaks and tremendous old azaleas at Afton Villa Gardens in St. Francisville, and get a bird's-eye view of the Capitol Gardens from atop the towering Baton Rouge monument. From Shreveport's American Rose Center to quaint courtyards hidden in busy New Orleans, you'll enjoy landscapes large and small, expected and unexpected. And all of them can wait on your coffee table year-round, ready to visit anytime you want them to be in bloom.
Review from The Baton Rouge Advocate newspaper
Sunday, June 27, 1999
Magazine Section, pg. 12
LOUISIANA GARDENS TAKES YOU TO SOME QUIET, GREEN PLACES
By Greg Langley
Books Editor
The photography of Steven Brooke and the writing of Mary Fonseca combine in a superb collection highlighting gardens across the state in Louisiana Gardens. (Pelican, $19.95 soft cover).
Featuring lush color shots of blooming plants and meandering trails, the book also offers up history, botanical history and local legends.
"Susan and David Barrow modeled the forty-room home they built in 1849, in the gentle hills that roll down to the Mississippi River near St. Francisville, after a chateau they had visited in Tours, in the Loire valley of France. They incorporated David's small ancestral home into the spacious mansion they christened Afton Villa and surrounded it with extensive lawns, terraced gardens, a boxwood maze, and a summerhouse. It was their family home until the Civil War liberated the slaves who built and sustained the plantation gentry's elaborate estates."
Too bad the names of the slaves couldn't be included in the description of the St. Francisville landmark.
Other area gardens featured in the book are The Capitol Gardens-designed by E.A. "Ned" McIlhenny and completed in 1932, Windrush Gardens at the LSU Rural Life Museum, Rosedown Plantation and Gardens in St. Francisville, the Laurens Henry Cohn Sr. Memorial Arboretum just north of Baton Rouge, the LSU Hilltop Arboretum on Highland Road, and Audubon State Commemorative Area at St. Francisville.
Each garden is described and displayed in plentiful photographs. A list at the back of the book has addresses, hours, cost of admission (many are free) and directions to the gardens. While all the more famous gardens in Louisiana-Hodges Gardens at Many, Zemurray Gardens near Hammond, The American Rose Center near Shreveport, The Jungle Gardens of Avery Island-are given prominent spreads, one of the charms of this book is the overlooked gardens that it features.
Many people don't realize that there are fine gardens at City Park and Audubon Park in New Orleans, or that many French Quarter Patios and Parterres are classic studies in small, urban gardens. There's even a small lagniappe chapter at the back of the book that lists additional gardens and nature preserves to explore. It was gratifying to find the Bluebonnet Swamp Nature Center listed there with the Centenary College Arboretum, the Longleaf Trail Scenic Byway (in Kisatchie National Forest), the Louisiana Nature Center in New Orleans, the Northlake Nature Center in Covington and many other scenic areas that feature plants and flower s in natural settings.
Buy this book now and find out where to go to see beautiful fall plants. Or save it for a Christmas gift so the recipient can use it to plan spring sojourns amid the beautiful blooms of Louisiana. It's a great reference and entertaining reading as well.
Review from the Shreveport Times
Sunday, June 20, 1999
Page 22A
'LOUISIANA GARDENS' IS WONDERFUL VISUAL TRIP
By Celia Jones
Special to The TimesThe print jacket of Louisiana Gardens is enticement enough to venture further. The cover photograph depicts the ruins and beautifully adapted landscaping designed for Afton Villa in St. Francisville by Neil Odenwald.
If "A" is for Afton Villa, the reader can't wait to see every garden included in the book, all the way to "Z" for the Zemurray Gardens of Loranger. It depicts 29 of Louisiana's most beautiful gardens. The prose is descriptive and easy to read and gave the information I was looking for, including garden histories. The photography by Steve Brooke is outstanding.
The content of Louisiana Gardens is broken down into categories: gardens, plantation gardens, arboretums, parks and commemorative areas, and nature preserves.
Something for everyone, whether you are inclined toward formal, everything-in-its-place-type gardens, or the lovely informality of Kalorama in Collinston or Briarwood Nature Preserve with its abundance of native flora and fauna cared for lovingly by Jessie and Richard Johnson.
Having visited most of the gardens included, the descriptions are right on target. In just reading the acknowledgments, one is aware Fonseca picked the cream of the crop of Louisiana gardeners to provide information. That includes Shreveport's own living treasure, Cleo Barnwell.
Shreveport's American Rose Center and Barnwell Memorial Garden and Art Center are given good coverage.
It is no coincidence most of the gardens are shown in spring. This is the time to visit most of them. Our climate is so conducive to spring's beauties: daffodils, azaleas, flowering native shrubs and wildflowers.
In a recent visit to Hodges Gardens, the small "Fairy Garden" proved to be my favorite. Although the abundance of various spring blossoms were long spent, this garden was cool, colorful and evocative of "wee ones."
A good summer outing to New Orleans could include a visit to the Audubon Park and Zoo to envy Joseph Bath's elephant and hippo statuary as they enjoy splashing in Cooper Fountain. Hilltop Arboretum always has some interesting program going on even in the summer months.
The garden's histories are intriguing with many ups and downs, semi-revivals, lapses of care and new beginnings. In the case of Afton Villa, the lovely phoenix arising from the ashes is an apt description.
Some gardens have been authentically restored to the original condition, including meticulous care to replant only heirlooms of the period. Others preserve the "spirit" of the originators, which was often inventive and adventurous.
The maps and visiting information, including telephone numbers, and other listings and suggestions make this an excellent volume.
If you love gardens, or ever plan to visit one, if you think there's nothing beautiful in Louisiana or if your in-laws are coming in from Minnesota, this book provides the relief.
Review from the Lafayette Daily Advertiser
October 7, 1999FONSECA'S BOOK ON GARDENS INFORMATIVE
by C.J. Babineaux
YoungsvilleI wish to recommend to your readers, a book that I recently checked out from our public library. It is entitled: Louisiana Gardens by Mary Fonseca with photography by Steven Brooke. The book is only 128 pages long, but provides a very good visitor's guide to 29 of Louisiana's most beautiful gardens.
Mary not only covers 13 public tour gardens but also plantation gardens, arboretums, parks and commemorative areas, and nature preserves. She relates the highlights of each garden as well as its history and development. Focal point photographs enhance each synopsis.
An appendix gives visitor information such as maps, addresses and cost of admission, etc. She also includes a lagniappe listing of additional 15 gardens and nature preserves to explore.
I do not know Mary, but if you enjoy touring gardens and nature areas, you would find this book informative. It is published by Pelican Publishing of Gretna.
THE MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW
GREENSPAN'S BOOKSHELF
James A. Cox
Editor-in-chief
mwbookrevw@aol.com
http://www.execpc.com/-mbr/bookwatch/Louisiana Gardens
Mary Fonseca & Steven Brooke
Pelican Publishing Company
P.O. Box 3110 Gretna, LA 70054
1-56554-306-8 $19.95 (pb)
1-56554-305-X $29.95 (hc)
1-800-843-1724Superbly illustrated with the stunning photography of Steven Brooke, Mary Fonseca's Louisiana Gardens showcases that state's traditional gardens, plantation gardens, arboretums, parks, commemorative areas, and nature preserves. It will awe and inspire gardeners everywhere. From the Louisiana State Arboretum (the first state-supported arboretum in the United States) to the Audubon Park and Zoological Gardens (featuring the work of renowned landscape planner John Charles Olmsted and a world-class zoo that is home to more than 1,800 animals), Louisiana Gardens is a splendid presentation and horticulturists' delight offering helpful maps of directions to every flower bed from Afton Villa Gardens in St. Francisville to Zemurray Gardens in Loranger.
THE GARDEN TOURIST 2001
Lois Rosenfeld
"An absolute must for any garden tourist to Louisiana, virtual or actual."
Please direct inquiries about purchasing a copy of the book,
Louisiana Gardens
to:
PELICAN PUBLISHING CO.
1-800-843-1724
FAX: (504)368-1195
PELICAN PUBLISHING CO. WEBSITE
Amazon has currently ranked
Louisiana Gardens
the 17th most popular book
within the Purchase Circle category of
books unique to Louisiana.
Photo credit:
Oscar Rajo - Photographer, Metairie, Louisiana
© 1999 Mary Fonseca. All rights reserved.
