The Productive Garden An essential guide towards self-sufficiency

by Hafferty, Stephanie

• ISBN13: 9780711293335
• ISBN10: 0711293333
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2026-03-03
• Publisher: Frances Lincoln

Summary

Swap your trolley for a trug and learn how to grow your own food and make your own household essentials for modern day self-sufficiency. Written by No Dig guru Stephanie Hafferty, and photographed by Jason Ingram. 
 
Self-sufficiency needn’t be something you dream of as you shuffle down the aisles of a soulless supermarket. It’s far easier than you think to grow your own, save money, reduce your consumption, increase your resilience and care for the planet – all from your own back yard. Stephanie Hafferty does it every day. From her No Dig garden she grows the food she needs to eat and the plants she needs to help her produce everyday essentials from cleaning products to hand cream. With more than 30 years of experience, she knows how to make a harvest stretch further, get the most out of the non-renewables, and how to feed the earth so that it can give back, year after year.

In this book, Stephanie introduces you to everything you need to grow abundant and useful crops, and teaches you what to do with them. This beautiful book covers: 

Part One: In the Garden

• Planning a self-sufficient garden
• Effective techniques for making compost, storing water, protecting crops and improving your soil
• Working with nature to increase biodiversity and control 'pests'
• Creating a planting plan unique to your space
• Sowing and propagating

Part Two: Seasonal Produce

•  A complete guide to Stephanie's tried-and-tested plants and unique varieties, covering vegetables, fruit, herbs and flowers

Part Three: In the House

• Recipes for a homegrown larder (including preserves, oils, ferments, vinegars, cordials and more)
• Chemical-free cleaners, fragrances, soaps and food wraps
  Using produce to improve wellbeing, such as making body care products, herbal remedies and natural first aid kit)
• Garden crafts (including preserved flowers, flower-pounding techniques and homemade papers)
  
  

As a leading No Dig expert and teacher, Stephanie can show you sustainable methods of cultivating a generous and abundant garden that brings together affordable homesteading with the reality of modern life. Whether you want to start small, have already embarked on a journey to self-sufficiency or are looking for a complete lifestyle change, this will become your go-to book and essential guide. 
 

Author Biography

Stephanie Hafferty is an award-winning garden writer, organic gardener, designer, food writer and educator, who has been growing her own food for more than 30 years. As well as growing abundant gardens on a shoestring budget for her family, Stephanie has worked as a kitchen and market gardener for restaurants and clients such as Sir Cameron Macintosh and Hauser & Wirth Somerset. Stephanie teaches gardening, homesteading and cooking around the world, including at major RHS shows, Kew Gardens and BBC Gardeners’ World Live, and writes widely for magazines such as Kitchen Garden, BBC Gardeners’ World, Bloom and Amateur Gardening. Stephanie is co-author of No Dig Organic Home & Garden (2017) and author of The Creative Kitchen (2018).