She wasn't only beloved because of her beautiful flower garden plans and ideas, but because of her memorable prose.

Quotations from Vita

Planting Design

“Big groups, big masses; I am sure that it is more effective to plant 12 tulips together than to split them into two groups of six”

...the spotty effect can be avoided by massing instead of dotting plants here and there.”

Specific Plants

“Climbers are among the most useful plants. They take up little ground space, and can be employed for many purposes: to clothe a fence, to scramble over a dead tree, to frame an archway, to drape a wall, to disguise a shed, or to climb lightly into a pergola. They demand relatively little attention, once they have taken hold of their support, maybe a yearly pruning or a rescue if they have come adrift in a gale.”

Her Flower Observations:

Magnolia grandiflora

‘great white pigeons settling among dark leaves’

Corsican hellebore

Before the flower buds open they look not unlike a bunch of Muscat grapes, but presently they open out flat, when they look like a miniature pale green water-lily, if you can imagine a water-lily about the size of a penny.

Roses

"We have kept the purple roses more or less in a bed to themselves… Let us admit that the purple rose may be an acquired taste, and by purple rose I do not mean a red rose which “dies” badly, anathema to all rosarians…

I mean the truly intentional purple, whether it be the slaty-lilac of Cardinal Richelieu, or the Parmaviolet Tour de Malakov, or Charles de Mills, or Belle de Crécy, or Reine des Violettes, or Hippolyte which by the way does much better in semi-shade, and the moss William Lobb. These, and others, we have assembled in a corner, with an under planting of dark-mauve pansies, Cheiranthus mutabilis, and Allium cyaneum, and the old R. Veilchenblau climbing the wall behind them. If people don’t like them, they can turn their backs and look at some-thing else, but I think the loss is theirs."

Plant Suggestions

Summer Annuals

I am very fond of Leptosiphon; only three inches in height, but very varied in colour, it is charming as an edging, or among stones, or in paving. It likes full sun. Linaria associates well with it, being several inches taller, but of the same delicate character, as the name Fairy Bouquet will suggest. Phacelia campanularia, nine inches, sown in large patches, will quickly make a mat of gentian-blue.

On Gardening

Gardening is a luxury occupation; an ornament, not a necessity, of life. The farmer is not at all concerned with the eventual beauty of his corn as a feature in the landscape, though, indeed, he gets a certain satisfaction out of it, as he leans against his gate on a summer evening, and sees his acres gently curving to the breeze. Still, beauty is not his primary aim; the gardener's is. Fortunate gardener, who may preoccupy herself solely with beauty in these difficult and ugly days! She is one of the few people left in this distressful world to carry on the tradition of elegance and charm. A useless member of society, considered in terms of economics, she must not be denied her rightful place. She deserves to share it, however humbly, with the painter and the poet.

-Vita Sackville-West, from Country Notes

Of Her Efforts at Sissinghurst

"For the last 40 years of my life I have broken my back, my fingernails, and sometimes my heart, in the practical pursuit of my favourite occupation."

Cottage Gardening