Blazing colours, luxuriant foliage and heady scents epitomize the long hazy days of summer.
After the delights of spring, with its delicate displays of bulbs and other early-flowering plants, mixed and herbaceous borders come into their own. Clumps of perennials fill their allotted spaces and colour is more vibrant. It is the time for roses, mock oranges, peonies, bearded irises, old-fashioned pinks, lilies, annuals and bedding plants.
When planning associations for this season, remember that much of the gardening year is still to come, so space must be left for later-flowering plants. Use their mounds of fresh green foliage, with promise of further colour, as a background or foil.
The choice of plants that flower throughout the summer months is overwhelming, tempting us to cram as many different varieties as possible into borders. Resist this, and aim instead for simple partnerships, using several plants of the same species for large and bold effect. The result will be more interesting and restful than one with numerous varieties in different shapes and colours.
It is quite possible to create a grouping with only one flowering variety, the rest of the ‘canvas’ consisting of beautiful foliage. Try planting several corms of the hardy Gladiolus byzantinus, which has magenta flowers (often a colour difficult to place), among the low-growing variegated shrub Euonymous fortunei ‘Silver Queen’. They will increase year after year, and the shrub’s silvery-white variegation sets off the one sided spikes of the gladiolus.
If you can’t resist several flowering varieties together, a pretty, cottage garden effect can be obtained by combining three annuals: baby’s breath (Gypso-phila elegans), love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena) and larkspur (Delphinium ajacis). Baby’s breath grows to about 45-60cm (lV2-2ft) tall and has grey-green leaves with masses of small white (sometimes pink) flowers online.
The blue or white love-in-a-mist is about the same height so plant it beside the baby’s breath. Larkspur has blue, pink or white flowers and is best placed behind the others because its stately flower spikes can reach 90cm (3ft) high. The result is a delicate, misty combination of soft pastels.
High summer
This colourful group of low-growing plants will be in bloom for several months. Dominated by a yellow potentilla (Potentilla fruticosa) and a pink rock rose (Helianthemum nummularium), the blue Campanula portenschlagiana and red crane’s bill (Geranium sanguineum) attempt to exceed their allotted space.
Backed by the tea-scented hybrid musk rose ‘Buff Beauty’ this long-flowering group creates a pool of soft colours. Tall lavender-blue Campanula lactiflora ‘Pritchard’s Variety’ complement the white, purple-streaked trumpets of Lilium regale, their feet shrouded in an edqinq of pink Geranium endressii and lemon-scented Thymus x citriodorus.
Sun revellers
Annual Zinnia elegans produces dahlia-like blooms in a richly coloured tapestry, ideal for filling gaps in the herbaceous border. Tall spikes of stately blue delphiniums provide a dramatic background for a planting of sneezeweed (Helenium autumnale ‘Bressingham Gold’) whose golden-bronze flowers, suffused with crimson, persist through summer and into autumn.
