The Urban Garden - 101 Ways to Grow Food and Beauty in the City

By Kathy Jentz & Teri Speight
Cool Springs Press, April 2022

The Urban Garden by Kathy Jentz & Teri Speight has a lot of good ideas for city gardening. About half of the book is comprised of carefully chosen photos of flower, vegetable and herb gardens -- and many of the photos are full-page.

Some of the most useful tips are recommendations about specific plants for specific purposes—white and pastel flowers that open at night, making them well suited for a night garden; types of ground cover that also act as mulch; plants that are self-seeding and may come back the next year, even though they’re not perennials; woody plants that are good for espaliering (attaching branches to a wall for decoration, a technique that also maximizes growing space).

Some of the other material I found most valuable:

• Succession planting – spreading out your vegetable planting over time to keep a steady supply through the growing season
• The suggestion to use plastic bottles in the bottom of big planters for drainage and to lighten the weight of the planter
• How to make your own hypertufa troughs (a combination of human-made rock from various aggregates bonded together using cement).

You’d need a larger patio or yard than mine to be interested in some of the furniture, decorations and dining ideas, creative as they are. I think many urban gardeners would, however, be interested in more information on pest control, and not just insects. (I live in Chicago and keeping rats out is a big issue here.)

Overall, the book is informative for urban gardeners. While it is available as an e-book, I think it would best be enjoyed in traditional book form due to the attractive photography and design.

Reviewed by Joan Engebretson, who, when not writing, spends time cooking and gardening in Chicago.