RHS Encyclopedia of Plants and Flowers Hardcover – 1 Sept. 2010

This is such a beautiful book. It has THOUSANDS of photographs. The first few chapters set out how to lay out a garden and mix colours; there is a useful and huge index of plant names and care instructions; and the best bit of all is the majority of the book, which is dedicated to setting out thousands of plant species with photographs of various types, where they grow, when they grow, etc. It's a great book for identifying plants as well as looking up care instructions. I bought this as a gift and it was very well-received. It is a huge tome, and can be studied for hours, or flicked through for inspiration.

What a lovely surprise I got when I briefly went through this book. However there was better to come. The presentation is clear and is very easy to understand. The quality of the photographs is good and gives clear pictures of what plants and flowers should look like. Above all the description and instruction for planting various plants is second to none. Although I live in southern Spain everything is as relevant as though I were in the UK. A very informative book which I would recommend to anyone thinking of taking up gardening.

I bought this book as a gift for a friend who has just discovered gardening! I've had a copy for years and, if you only ever have one gardening book, make it this one. It's so useful, enabling you to identify any plant and all its requirements, plus the plant/shrub/tree's final height and width etc. .....and means you can choose just the right plant/tree/shrub for any situation. Because of the way it's set out you can identify any plant easily, ( ie so if it's a shrub, with red flowers in the Summer you can go straight to it! ) so it actually is more user friendly than Google! Excellent and worth the investment, you'll use it for a lifetime.

This is a really good book containing a wealth of information but I have not always found it easy to use. The layout of the book is well explained at the beginning but being largely in two sections, one of pictures and names of plants in various categories and the other as an A-Z text-only dictionary, it can be rather frustrating trying to identify a plant for which you do not have a name and for which you only have a small sample - perhaps just some leaves and a few flowers. For it to be more useful to me, I would have preferred to see the dictionary with sample pictures interspersed within it.

It is everything I could expect from a good book about plants. It allows you to easily find a plant you need by looking through useful bookmarks on the sides of pages. Descriptions of the plants are not too long and detailed, only this could be improved. All in all, this book is only meant to give you a general idea about a plant that you can examine closer in other books or looking up on the internet. I also enjoy the included lists for particular sites like sandy and dry soils and such. The book is worth recommending to any landscape architecture student. Totally worth the price! :)

Bought as a present for a knowledgable gardener and very well received. Would also suit keen amateur as it gives guidance on design and plant selection. Note this is a huge and heavy book so take care if you have issues with lifting, not one to take to the garden centre!Well laid out and the photos are very useful in identification. A good reference book with new ideas and colour combinations in the garden.

Ideal for all levels of gardener as the descriptions and photographs are lovely. Great for a quick reference guide if you see a plant you'd like but are not sure if it's suitable for your garden.Big, heavy book and I managed to buy it from Amazon at £16.75, so it made a perfect gift as it is so substantial it looked liked I'd spent much more!

The illustrations are beautiful in this book. It is so informative I should not have to phone around for plant names and gardening advice any more. There is one thing to bear in mind and, that is,that the book is huge and very heavy indeed It would not fit through a letterbox And consider the strength of the recipetent when buying.