A garden should sparkle all year round… This is easy to achieve as there are plants that will flower at different times of the year.
The first consideration to make even before you start thinking about plants is the size of the garden, and who will be using the space.
I really do think it’s important to address both of these even before you start thinking about the type of soil that you have and whether the garden is sunny or shady, and at what times of the day.
The next question you have to ask yourself is how wide your flower beds are going to be.
There is absolutely no point in having a plant that will grow to 4 metres high if your flower beds are less than a metre wide. The chances are that this 4 metre high plant will need 3-4 mtres of width to grow and stretch naturally.
The alternative will be that you will spend your time hacking back (yes, I did use the word hacking as that is precisely what you will be doing) to try and keep the plant in its allotted space.
Every good garden centre will label plants carefully and all the planting information should be there. Most novice gardeners take more notice of the final height (in approx 10 years) than its associated spread.. It’s normally expressed as ‘x H/x S’: ignore the latter dimension at your peril!
I do think that a small garden is more of a challenge than a large one. To this end I have compiled a list of small well-behaved plants (all below 1m in height) which I am happy to send you ABSOLUTELY FREE. It is a small list, and other subjects can be added. The pic above shows you some really narrow bed plants
I have divided my list up into seasons of interest which should give you a good starting point for your plant shopping list. If you would like a FREE copy, then please use this button to send me an email request.
Request Plant List
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