The overwhelming theme of my garden this month seems to be scent. There are masses of sweet smelling blooms on the roses, honeysuckle and philadelphus. It’s a pleasure to walk along the borders and now much narrower paths, especially on a warm day when the the flowers’ scents seem strongest. There is a climbing rose growing by my front door which fills the front… Read more →
Tag: flowers
A Midsummer Garden
After a sunny week in Portugal, I arrived back home to a surprisingly lush garden. I’d expected to return to dried out hanging baskets and shriveled pot plants. Instead, I found everything overgrown. Our English summer has been dreadfully rainy so far, but it’s made my borders blousy and gorgeously verdant, so I don’t mind. This is what midsummer should look… Read more →
May: What To Do Now
In my garden this month, the tulips have made way for the irises. Bearded iris flowers provide fat brushstrokes of colour that tower over the borders on tall stems. The smaller flowers of siberian and dutch irises are just as rich in colour, with contrasting throat markings and an intricate petal shape. They are exquisite. Aquilegia (also known as granny’s… Read more →
April: What To Do Now
For me early spring has been all about bold blues, yellows and acid greens. It’s a colour combination I love to see after the monochromes of winter. In our front garden, primroses and grape hyacinths (muscari) are self-seeding happily in one border (see photo above), while on the other side of the path, dog violets and a creeping sedum, whose… Read more →
Floral eye candy for a grey Monday
There are still lots of special things to see in my garden, even though we are nearing the end of autumn. On cloudy days, the few remaining flowers look so bright they seem to shout through the browns, greys and increasingly dull greens, and I just have to go out there and have a closer look. So I thought I… Read more →
October: What To Do Now
The bottom of my garden smells of fennel today. Seven-foot stems, covered in feathery leaves, are holding up dried seedheads at just the right height for me to get a good sniff as I walk past. And there are still so many jewel-coloured flowers out: roses, sedums, mallows, hardy fuschia, verbena bonariensis. Some flowers are only just coming into their… Read more →
A is for Asters in August :: A to Z of Gardens
It’s the back-end of summer and your garden may be looking rather tired; as I do, frankly, five weeks into the long school holiday with two kids. By mid-August, the gorgeous, floriferous peak of early summer stalwarts is long past. The wisteria, geraniums, aquilegias, alliums, foxgloves, bearded irises and roses have ‘gone over’, and either been cut back or left… Read more →