Fairy Gardening: Creating Your Own Magical Miniature Ga… (2024)

Most of the fairy gardening books out right now focus on pretty photographs without much useful content. Julie Bawden-Davis and Beverly Turner's book is a refreshing change from that trend. The book is still loaded with gorgeous pictures, but it also comes with practical advice for fairy gardeners. In addition to great design tips, there is also plenty of information on how to properly plant a miniature garden and a decent list of plants best suited for fairy gardening. If you are looking for a true fairy gardening manual instead of a picture book, this is the book for you.

Great primer on creating fairy gardens. Provides information on containers, plants, design, and storytelling. Lots of professionally photographed examples. Plenty of resources listed with online links.

Julie Bawden-Davis and Beverly Turner’s beautiful book Fairy Gardening doesn’t delve into specific fairy garden designs such as the ones you’ll find in Fiona McDonald’s Fairy Gardening 101, but it is more detailed in all of the crafting aspects needed to make your own amazing fairy gardens. One of the most charming reasons to create a fairy garden is the way you can tell a story with your living work, and Bawden-Davis and Turner cover everything from developing a theme to establishing a focal point, developing your story, and creating a sense of movement is discussed in accessible, practical terms, with tips and suggestions to apply these ideas to your own gardens. Additional chapters include comprehensive information about choosing containers for your garden, and selecting the perfect plants to grow. Delightful photographs and a friendly, approachable writing style make this book a joy to read – and a wealth of inspiration for creating your very own fairy garden!

Note: This review is for the kindle version.

This is the right author to write a book on fairy gardening. The author has an excellent voice. It feels as if you are at a workshop or her nursery where she’s carefully chosen a number of fairy gardens for you to be inspired by and to make.

She brings up things that maybe the average person wouldn’t think about, such as actually working at a dollhouse scale of 1:12 and placing simple figurines in a way that connotes action.

She also explains why some materials work better than others, as well as recommendations for composition of a scene.

The final chapters of the book have recommended plants with common and Latin names, sorted by size/function and a few websites for tchotchkes.

This book has it all to get you started, answer questions and successfully create your first garden, however, it would be great to have a few updates: it would be nice to have the zones for each plant listed so you knew what to lo9 for at the nursery, and, for a kindle, the pictures just didn’t cut it for me. There weren’t very many, you had to enlarge each one to see anything, and i could not get the pictures in the colored sidebars open. I’m guessing that the pictures themselves and the ratio of text to pictures all lines up nicely in the paper book, but it would be nice if the kindle folks also thought about how the book would look for their readers.

Thank you!

My family absolutely loved this book! A great read for making fairy gardens for all ages. We had a "fairy garden" event and made gardens together - me and my girlfriends, and our young kiddos too! The book is organized and well written. Covers all aspects of what you need to know, and lots of inspiration and ideas too! Gives you pointers on themes, so that you can decide what accessories to get, the types of plants, etc. and focus around a main "piece" or focal point. The kids got to pick their themes too - one did a dinosaur, another a farm with small animals, mine had little creatures like a bunny and mice. It was so fun! I liked seeing the different types of plants you can get, and helped me think out everything I need to get ahead of time before "creating" our mini fairy gardens!

Challenge: Curious Read Non-fiction 2020 - Read about craft/activity, then try it (5), and, read a fiction with the theme, then a non-fiction about that topic (8). Having just read 'A Sprinkling of Murder' the debut book in the 'Fairy Garden' mysteries by Daryl Wood Gerber, I was enchanted with the idea of renovating the overgrown and empty pots on my front porch as fairy gardens. So I wanted to read up on it first. This volume on fairy gardening has first rate designs and tips on how to enjoy this past time. A nice starter book.

I picked up this book because I want to make my own kind of fairy garden and I wanted to get some ideas. I liked how they also talk about what are fairy gardens and had some great ideas on what a person can do.

Small/Mini Gardens only

Great ideas for small potted gardens. Only plant list and a few other things were beneficial to someone like me looking for something a lot larger.

The ideas in this book have really inspired me to make my own miniature gardens, with or without fairies.

It's a cute little how-to, sufficient instruction to get started and pretty photos for inspiration.

I picked this up on a whim and now I'm ready to make a garden! Very practical. Great pictures.

Skimmed as a resource.

Pretty juvenile and heavily reliant on premade fairy accessories.

Good overall book with specific points to consider in design which were helpful. Decent list of plants given, but would have been helpful to list what plants were used in the pictured designs.

Lots of great pictures and information.

A fun informative look at creating fairy gardens. It's a great starting point that will open up your mind to different themes, concepts.

Charming with useful tips. I wish that the second on dwarf plants had picture of those plants, not just written discriptions.

good for tips and ideas for making refined potted fairy garden scenes using premade props. a lot about achieving desired aesthetics, as well as information on appropriate plants.

I've been wanting to start a Fairy Garden, and this book had a lot of helpful ideas and hints, with great photos. There was even a section on how to decorate your garden for holidays. But what I found most helpful was the list of miniature plants and their description, which helps in planning a garden. Also, there was a great Resource section in the back for purchasing supplies. This section listed the vendors, web addresses if they have one, and other important contact information. Even the type of items you could get from them (plants, furniture, etc.). It's a great resource book for a beginner like myself to get ideas and helpful hints.

Cute and design-focused, though twasn't quite what I was looking for. This works better for potted, indoors mini-gardens, fairies mandatory.

I'm looking for planter, outdoors mini-gardens, figurines optional.

Very fascinating, Fairy Gardens are wonderful. They are beautiful and lovely and tell a story and seem so easy to do for those who don't normally garden. I could see this being a very addictive hobby if or when I decided to try it.

Too structured and organized. I think I'd rather do it on my own. This-for me-seemed to take all the fun out of just making something.

Was not impressed. It seemed more like a sales catalog and used a bit of plastic junk.

Beautiful gardens with all those fantasy characters inside. Beautiful book.

Best one I have read thus far! I can't wait to try some of these suggestions.

Fun ideas, but more focused on containers rather than larger areas. Kids loved the pictures!

great ideas for creating fairy gardens, along with directions for some of the funiture

I was really disappointed in this book. It basically was everything I already knew. Was hoping for better ideas, more illustrations.

Too comercial...maybe because the author works for a garden design center? I'm interested in finding ideas emphasing the natural world.

Excellent book with many ideas for creative gardening!