André Le Nôtre in Perspective Hardcover – February 4, 2014

For once a publisher isn't kidding when it calls a book "magnificent." Whoever put this together did so with great care. Pages and pages of gorgeous photos, drawings, and paintings of Notre's designs. Even the embossed cover is lovely. And to pay $52 for it seems like a steal. I really only bought this on a whim, having visited Versailles and become a bit of a Francophile. I'm not even that interested in gardening and I'm a terrible gardener myself so I'm not even sure why I bought this. But ... wow. It's nice to get a book in your hands and not feel like you've paid too much, but feel like it was worth every penny.

A completely gorgeous book - beautiful cover and illustrations inside and great insight into formal garden design from one of the masters.

If you are doing research and need to know all about the wonderful garden designer Le Notre this is the book for you

Beautiful, amazing, must-have book!! Buy it, now!!! Le Nôtre has had a long range influence on every aspect of home and garden design.

Wow, even the embossed cover is impressive. The landscaper of Versailles, detailed with garden plans and lots of information. Great for gardeners and Francophiles.

This book is beautifully published. The illustrations are well chosen and beautifully printed. I can't believe I bought such a well crafted book at this price. The scholarship was great as well.

Books like this are a must for any design library. Beautifully done. Having visited several of the parcs in the book, the details regarding mechanics of the gardens works are fascinating and will contribute to my enjoyment of parcs I have already seen in France and the ones I will see next.

Interesting, but so so.

Impressive, well put together, and at times even moving, the book includes some discussion of how and why the gardens of Le Notre were not just simple, rather boring, over-grand displays. But in some ways it is also frustrating and disappointing. Having read that he was singularly sensitive to difficult and asymmetrical sites, being able to accept their limitations to turn them into triumphs, with Chantilly and Sceaux mentioned in particular, I had hoped that such a comprehensive and major book would analyse a selection of his best work in some detail. But there is very little analysis at all, and what there is suffers from a lack of integration of the text and illustrations. For all the detailed discussion of the gardens of Versailles, both of the main vista and of certain elements, there is no map clearly identifying the features mentioned or discussed. Maybe there was only space for the briefest discussion of his work, but without his work there would be no point in producing the book. And the final section on his influence was often particularly unsatisfying - all too often it seemed to amount to little more than that this or that element of the classical French garden was incorporated in the different designs.

Good for the coffee table

The writing is a bit flowery and OTT, but beautiful looking book