New Book Coming Soon!!
In Nature's Slipstream: Gardening at Old Blabean Stud by Carol Bruce
I am delighted to say that DK have offered to publish my new book! It will be in hardback illustrated with my garden photographs, and will contain everything you need to know to apply my gardening philosophy, design techniques and maintenance methods at home, either to an existing garden or when setting up a new one. The book is currently at the editing stage and publication is scheduled for Spring 2026, but I will update this page with news and in the meantime the synopsis below will give you an idea of what it covers. If you would like to be informed when the book is available to order I would love to hear from you, so please submit your email address to me below.* Thank you!
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Synopsis
This book explains how I turned three acres of rough ground into a winner of the Nation’s Favourite Gardens competition by developing an innovative gardening system that harnesses natural processes instead of fighting them. Isolating myself from existing schools of thought on gardening, I studied the circle of life in the surrounding countryside and developed my own unique gardening philosophy, landscape-inspired design techniques and ecological garden maintenance methods that all work together as a holistic system.
Due to its origins and inspiration my garden is a novel hybrid between a cultivated and a wild environment, and I share the eight design techniques I use to instantly show the reassuring presence of a human hand. These include colour scheming, an emphasis on strong lines of sight, and just one or two labour-intensive elements with a high visual impact. Simultaneously, I use ten maintenance practices that allow the garden to function in the same way as the surrounding countryside. For example, I grow evolving populations of pollinator-friendly perennial species instead of individual named cultivars, all wildlife is welcome, nothing is ever deadheaded so the seeds form part of the garden’s ecosystem, and I have a strict policy of never watering anything. My garden thrives precisely because it is exposed to natural selection rather than protected from it.
In preserving the integrity of natural systems while imposing the key visual components of a well-tended English garden, I have combined the best of both worlds and turned my garden into an ornamental ecosystem and a living work of art. Readers are shown how to create this in their own gardens and given detailed information on forty-four of the flowering perennial species that thrive here as self-sowing populations.
The distinctive elemental feel of my garden is the result of layout ideas gleaned from the surrounding countryside such as the use of curved paths, three storeys of planting and the diorama effect, and I describe eleven of these for readers to use at home. Nine benefits of colour scheming are explained, and readers are shown six different illustrated colour schemes with associated plant lists. My wildflower-inspired technique of processional planting within fixed design roles is explained, together with illustrations and suggested plants. I also share a novel step-by-step method for extending the flowering season in an existing garden that combines three of my original design techniques.
I maintain the three-acre garden single-handedly in just five hours a day, and this has produced some innovative gardening methods. Readers are taken through my annual cycle of jobs and shown the tools I use so that they can try the same methods at home. They are also introduced to my approach to constraints, problem solving and planning to help them resolve gardening challenges of their own.
In the interests of the environment many gardeners are trying to add back natural elements to traditionally cultivated gardens piecemeal, but the result often looks scruffy and neglected. Instead, my system was designed from the start to produce the look of a well-tended English garden, while functioning in the same way as a wild place. With the help of this book, readers can apply my system to their own gardens in the knowledge that it has been tried and tested here for over twenty years.