Eat Your Garden - by Harry Holding (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

The first book to focus on a style of edible gardening that is lower in effort, higher in style and less demanding of space than the traditional kitchen garden or vegetable plot.

Eat Your Garden is a grow-your-own book with a difference: its focus is on edimentals, plants that are both edible and ornamental. They offer a sustainable and beautiful way to grow food in your garden, whether it's large, urban or a balcony, or in containers. Much like a potager garden, this is a naturalistic, stylish and low-maintenance method of integrating edible plants, largely perennials, within your existing garden, whatever its style and without the need to create a dedicated space. Harry will introduce you to the huge range of plants available, from the familiar to the surprising and lesser known, so you can grow a diverse range of plants that are good to eat, good for biodiversity and good for your health. He'll guide you on how to plan and design your planting schemes, considering form, layers, color and texture, as well as describing the pollinating effects they can have and the opportunities they create for you to forage in your own garden. There are also illuminating case studies on how edimentals are used in larger spaces and public gardens in the  US, UK and internationally, such as edible meadows, food forests, market gardens and permaculture systems as well as Harry's own award-winning RHS Chelsea show gardens, so that you can choose elements to suit your own space, conditions and climate. 

Harry's designs are plant driven and ecologically minded, focusing on creating resilient, immersive and enchanting spaces. Eat Your Garden is the first book to focus on a style of edible gardening that is lower in effort, higher in style and less demanding of space than the traditional kitchen garden or vegetable plot.

About the Author

Harry Holding is a leading voice in contemporary garden design and a pioneer of the edimental movement - the fusion of edible and ornamental planting. Since founding Harry Holding Studio in 2016, he has been named among House & Garden's Top 50 Garden & Landscape Designers and received multiple accolades from the RHS, the Society of Garden & Landscape Designers and other industry bodies. His School Food Matters Garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2023 won the People's Choice Award, earning praise from BBC Gardeners' World, The Times, The Telegraph, and Financial Times. In 2024, the RHS invited him to return and design their Feature Garden, further cementing his reputation as a leading figure in sustainable, plant-led design. Harry and his studio are designing a garden for RHS Chelsea 2026 in collaboration with the Eden Project.

Harry's work spans private gardens, public landscapes and international commissions, including a dedicated area of the new Shuttleworth Botanical Garden on the Isle of Man and an area of the new Eden Project in Morecambe. In 2025, the British Library selected him as one of ten international designers to contribute to Gardens of the Future, for which he envisioned a Future Food & Medicine Garden exploring sustainable community food systems. A regular tutor at the London College of Garden Design, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Harry is also a sought-after guest speaker on ecological design. Eat Your Garden is his debut book.