Financial Times 2000

Colour Borders by Anne Wareham

We are all plant hunters now. All it takes is a road sign saying "Nursery : Unusual Plants" to have us shooting off into the undergrowth of remote country lanes, bumping along cart tracks and ploughing through the in search of our quarry. Our Sunday visits to gardens open to the public under the National Garden Scheme all have to begin with a rush to the plant stall, in case all the best goodies have gone. We return home with cars looking like a forest on wheels, trees and shrubs sticking out of the sun roof, herbaceous perennials climbing out of the windows. We arrive home triumphant - then I wonder just how many of us try and sneak our purchases past a suspicious spouse, who is convinced the garden is quite full enough already? Then the horrible realisation which follows - that he's quite right, and where on earth are we going to put them all?

Lesson one is - never put them to one side and think you'll work it out later. The poor plants will sit there, suffering in their pots, silently reproaching you for your extravagance. Planting them will turn from a pleasure into a chore. Plant them as soon as you get home, (he'll never spot them then,) while the pleasure of acquisition is still upon you. For the next few days you will be calling on them first thing every day to see how they're doing, pleased to see them making their home with you instead of wilting in their pots.

So the crisis of finding a place is immediate, but it will be enormously simplified if you have colour schemes in your beds. This helps not only with finding a place where your new purchase will look at home, but will also help you make more sensible impulse buys. The elusive colour that your border needs is easy to remember when you were probably lamenting its absence that very morning. The very best time to fill a colour gap in a border with just the right colour is when the plant is in flower. And it is when a plant is in flower that we tend to fall for it in the nursery.The fashionable "white garden" is probably not the best scheme to begin with. There are far more shades of white than you ever realised before you began, and some make others look as if they need a wash in New Persil.

I find it easiest not to think so much of particular colours, rather to concentrate on tones of colour. When I began, I made rules for myself, like "no yellow" in one particular border. But then I realised that it was bright, hard yellows that didn't fit. Alchemilla Mollis has a yellow flower, but of such a soft tone that it fitted quite happily. That helped me see that I was looking for soft colours there.

Elsewhere, I found I wanted bright colours. I find these kinds of categories much easier to identify and look for than to try and name a particular colour and find its counterpart. It also helps make sense of what you see. You may think that yellow and pink are a poor combination, and it's true that they can kill each other. But it depends on the shades and tones of the colours. So holding your new purchase next to the plant that may become its neighbour is a much more reliable guide to what will work than a rule based on names of colours.

Crescent Border. © Charles Hawes

The ideal way to start a colour border is from scratch. If you should find yourself in this unusual and fortunate position, don't forget your weeds. You will be eternally grateful afterwards if you plan your border to include the colour of your predominant weed - unless you are one of those rare souls who keep an immaculate garden. I curse every year when I fondly gaze at my border of hardy geraniums in quiet pinks and soft blues - and find bright yellow creeping buttercup screaming defiance at me. This is an especially cunning weed because its leaf is so like that of a hardy geranium. If you want to grow hardy geraniums where you have creeping buttercup already sneaking around, then try the glorious magenta geranium psilostemon or"Ann Folkard" instead of the softer colours. Or, if that is a bit brave for you, one of the stronger blues, like geranium x magnificum.
I like to think that rose bay willow herb fits in all my colour schemes - well, I would like to think so, since it certainly tries to insinuate itself into them all. It is surprising how often it looks glorious. I love it where it grows all around a cornus alba Elegantissima - a variegated shrub with the additional treat of good red stems for winter if you cut it hard back in the spring. The willow herb also looks surprisingly good in my "bright" garden, with reds and strong yellows.

However, the mallow, malva moschata, which is another of my super weeds, does not. This is odd - because the colour is very similar to that of the willow herb. But it is one of the stars of my soft colour border. If it is not already one of your weeds it is worth growing from seed, along with purple loosestrife, (lythrum salicaria) for lovely late summer colour.If making a colour border would mean moving plants, autumn is the season for you to do it. The best time to move plants is when you can still remember what they are and see where they are. You don't have to set aside a whole border for one or two colours - you could range the colours down the border following the sequence of the rainbow. You can grow one series of colours in the spring, and have the border change colour in the autumn. The best bit will be that all your random purchases will not end up looking like a scrappy mess, but help to create a wonderful garden picture.

Published in Financial Times June 17th 2000

Front Garden. © Charles Hawes