Rachel "Bunny" Mellon existed on a level all her own. The wife of Paul Mellon, one of the wealthiest men in America, held perhaps the most recognizable, respected name in high society at the time, renowned for her work in philanthropy, art collecting, her incomparable style, and most notoriously, her garden design.

In Vendome's new book, The Gardens of Bunny Mellon, author Linda Jane Holden and photographer Roger Foley revisit the landscape building brilliance still on display at the many properties Bunny's green thumb touched over the years. From her private homes in New York, Cape Cod, Nantucket, Antigua and Virginia, to public projects she worked on, like the White House Rose Garden, commissioned by personal friend Jackie Kennedy, or the Portager du Roi at Versailles, which she restored with Hubert de Givenchy. And to think, we can barely keep a fiddle leaf fig alive!

Click through for an inside look at a few of her most iconic, lush creations.

[Photos courtesy Roger Foley for Vendome]