Italian Villas and Their Gardens.

WHARTON, Edith; Illustrated by Maxfield Parrish.

Item Number: 3975

New York: Century Club, 1904.

First edition. Quarto, original dark green cloth, top edge gilt. Wonderfully illustrated with drawings, photographs, and 26 full-color plates by Maxfield Parrish. In very good condition.

Edith Wharton’s Italian Villas and Their Gardens, a seminal work on garden design, is a testament to the passionate connoisseurship of one of America’s greatest writers. A comprehensive look at the history and character of Italian garden architecture and ornamentation, the book explores more than seventy-five villas, capturing what Wharton calls their "garden-magic" and illuminating the intimate relationship between the house, its formal gardens, and the surrounding countryside. "...Parish illustrations, in trademark dreamy, fairy-tale style--seems to dislocate these legendary gardens from time altogether" (Forbes).