Drawing on the enormous quantity of material available in the Woburn
Archives, as well as the historic images and details preserved in the
art in the Abbey itself, this book describes how the park and gardens
developed, following wider trends in landscaping as well as the
individual tastes of the successive dukes and duchesses. It also places
the significant developments in the park and gardens in the context of
the other gardens built at the time. Almost all of the important figures
in English landscaping--from Isaac de Caus to George London and Henry
Wise, Charles Bridgeman, and Humphry Repton--worked for the Bedford
family at one time or another. In our own time, a 10-year program of
restoration of Repton's Pleasure Gardens initiated by the present
Duchess is under way. When this is finished, in 2018, the result will be
the most complete Repton pleasure grounds anywhere in the world. In this
book Keir Davidson weaves specific and wider themes together in a way
that brings the whole enthralling story to life, engaging the reader
with historic gardens that are not simply part of a lost past, but can
be experienced today.