The Gardens of the British Working Class

Margaret Willes

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Paperback

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English

Yale University
25 April 2015

History; British & Irish history; Social & cultural history; Social classes

This magnificently illustrated people's history celebrates the extraordinary feats of cultivation by the working class in Britain, even if the land they toiled, planted, and loved was not their own. Spanning more than four centuries, from the earliest records of the laboring classes in the country to today, Margaret Willes's researchunearths lush gardens nurtured outside rough workers' cottages and horticultural miracles performed in blackened yards, and reveals the ingenious, sometimes devious, methods employed by determined, obsessive, and eccentric workers to make their drab surroundings bloom. She also explores the stories of the great philanthropic industrialists who provided gardens for their workforces, the fashionable rich stealing the gardening ideas of the poor, alehouse syndicates and fierce rivalries between vegetable growers, flower-fanciers cultivating exotic blooms on their city windowsills, and the rich lore handed down from gardener to gardener through generations. This is a sumptuous record of the myriad ways in which the popular cultivation of plants, vegetables, and flowers has played-and continues to play-an integral role in everyday British life.

By: Margaret Willes
Imprint: Yale University
Country of Publication: United States
Edition: 1
Dimensions: Height: 210mm, Width: 140mm, Spine: 3mm
Weight: 544g
ISBN: 9780300212358
ISBN 10: 0300212356
Pages: 424
Publication Date: 25 April 2015
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Margaret Willes is an enthusiastic gardener and the former publisher at the National Trust.

Reviews for The Gardens of the British Working Class

'...in this wonderfully rich study, Margaret Willes reveals the forgotten history of Britain's working-class horticulturalists'-PD Smith, the Guardian. -- P.D. Smith The Guardian