Gardens Of Persia

This is the first book to explore the evolution of the Persian paradise garden from ancient beginnings to today's modern Islamic designs. Buildings, water and plants combine to give the gardens of Persia a beauty, and a spiritual dimension, which has inspired garden design throughout the world.

Penelope Hobhouse starts with the world's first extant garden. Created by Cyprus the Great more than 2,500 years ago, the garden at Pasargadae represented paradise on earth - an enclosed four-fold layout providing shade, vegetation and a refuge.

With the coming of Islam, gardens became places for sacred contemplation and spiritual nourishment, developing in later centuries as settings for romance and, in the gardens of Mughal India, as representations of power and prestige as well as symbols of the afterlife.

Penelope Hobhouse sets the gardens in the context of Iran, a land where water is scarce, and links their development to Persia's great history and to religious and secular architecture.

The book demonstrates Penelope Hobhouse's rare ability to combine practical knowledge of gardens and plants with a love of garden history and travel.

Meticulously researched in Iran and drawing on a profound knowledge of gardens throughout the world, this wide-ranging account offers a stimulating new angle on gardening. It is beautifully illustrated with Jerry Harpur's specially commissioned photographs of gardens in Iran, India, Europe and the USA, and with sumptuous carpets and Persian miniatures.