“Color In and Out of the Garden pays homage to plants and processes, to seeing and believing in small acts of creativity as a means connecting to ourselves and the natural world. A gem of a book.”
author of Cultivated: The Elements of Floral Style

Color In and Out of the Garden so honestly taps into our visceral yearning to experience nature. Lorene Edwards Forkner's watercolor studies give the gift of sight and insight, inspiring any of us to make a personal practice of observing the palettes of our environment—during any season and at any place on this planet.
Founder/Creative Director, Slow Flowers Society

Color In and Out of the Garden is a rich visual feast for gardeners and artists alike. Lorene Edwards Forkner brings horticultural wisdom to the daily, restorative practice of painting. With a few tubes of paint and a bit of time and attention, she immerses herself in the wonder that can be found in her own backyard. What began as a hundred-day project in the aftermath of a devastating loss has become a personal journey, sustained over many years. With this gem of a book, we are all invited to take that journey with her.
New York Times bestselling author

From the evocative title of this heavenly missive, you might think you need to be a gardener or a painter to harvest the full richness of its many gifts, but you do not. You need only be human—as worried and full of wonder, as pained and patient (or impatient), peculiar and particular as all of us. This collection of careful color studies of botanical (flowers, leaves, seeds, stems) and botanically adjacent (think time worn stones, beach bleached shells) treasures is offered out to us by the knowing hands of a gardener, the refined eye of an artist, the time-tested taste of a cook, and the heart of a compassionate mother. On one level it is an encouragement to practice being present to practice paying attention and taking good care in and of the natural world, to practice really seeing; but on its highest level, it is a much needed (longed for?) reminder born of both joy and deep grief to live your own days (and thus life) in full color, in and out of the garden. A plea to savor and cherish every last living vibrant cell of it in the process: the extraordinary, the quotidian, the steadfast constants, and the heartbreakingly fleeting. A sometimes funny, sometimes sobering prayer to notice and celebrate all the variations and permutations of green (for survival), red (for ripeness), pink (for extravagance), yellow (for luminosity), orange (for energy) and brown—the foundation of all living things—in all their colorful diversity. As Lorene might say, “Yes, please.” See for yourself. You will never see your garden, food, art, sky, ground (life) quite the same again.
creator of the Cultivating Place, Conversations on Natural History and the Human Impulse to Garden podcast