Lisa,
Your plant selections are fine for your area. Have you discovered the New England Forum here on GW? This is a very active and helpful Forum of long time gardeners. Repost your question there for guidance re plants that are not familiar to you.

The only plant that I would have some reservations about is the Artemesia. There are a few (and I emphasize few) Artemesia that are well-behaved. The tendency for this genus is to take over the world with rampant spreading once they become established. The first year everything might look fine. However, in succeeding years it might start popping up five or six feet away from the mother plant after having already woven roots into other plants.

There is no denying the positive qualities that silver leaved foliage can impart to a garden scheme. However, we have no idea which Artemesia will be planted. Having said all the above, as long as you are mindful of the potential, it is possible to keep even fairly aggressive plants in check by judicious pulling from unwanted areas.

Perhaps you need to do a little more research on this item.

IronBelly

I see one plant that certainly isn't hardy to New England, although the common name you used is probably the plant you meant, and not Chamelaucium uncinatum, which is a USDA zone 9/10 plant, known as the Geraldton Wax Flower and very useful for florists here in California. I think you probably meant one of the Callicarpa species.

While the species chosen may be great, it is also useful to know what kind of spacing you intend, and whether you have accounted for mature sizes, or will be obligating yourself to alot of pruning down the road to keep everything in balance. If you have any local botanic gardens near you, or older homes with mature landscaping, it might be very useful to see how large some of these things get in your local conditions, and take a fresh look at your proposed plant locations. Beginning gardeners too often overlook the fact that plants can look deformed if they need to be constantly pruned, and the plants will always look best if allowed to assume their natural size inclinations. Use more annuals or short lived perennials as filler if you like the immediate full look, rather than crowding your permanent shrubs.

bahia -

Thank you very much for finding a mistake in my latin names. The name I intended to type was Callicarpa dicholora 'Purple Pride' which is the Purple Beautyberry I meant to include. It is correct in my hand written plot, but when I made the list I did some cutting and pasting to the web and this made it through by mistake.

As to sizes, in my plot, I have scaled my circles to the size of maturity I found on the web, but it is a great idea to look at the actual plants in this setting. Who knows how big somethings might actually grow.

If anyone has experience with real mature sizes, I would love to hear it. The diameters I have allowed are as follows:

Fothergilla 'Mt. Airy' or 'Beaver Creek' 6'
Purple Beautyberry Callicarpa dicholora ÂPurple Pride 6'
Caryopteris x clandonensis First Choice 4'
Purpleleaf Sandcherry (Prunus x cistena) 7'
Spiraea nipponica 'Snowmound' 5'
Picea omorika 'Nana' Dwarf Serbian spruce 6'
Cotoneaster salicifolius 'Scarlet Leader' 3'
Berberis thunbergii var. atropurpurea 'Crimson Pygmy' 3'

Do these sound appropriate or optimistic?

Lisa

The Artemisia I have is Artemisia stelleriana, 'Silver Brocade'. It can be a larva host plant for the Painted and American Lady according to a number of butterfly sites. So far it had been well-behaved in the other garden, but I will keep an eye out for it. Thanks for the warning!

Lisa

Since this is the landscape design forum feel free to scan in your planting design and include it. It is rather hard to critique a plant list. Pictures are always helpful as well.

What is the reason for the 6' of topsoil? That seems like a lot unless you are talking about a raised bed. Have you thought about how this might affect drainage?

If cost is a concern, many of the perennials listed grow fast from seed. 90% of the perennials in my (rather new) garden were grown via winter sowing (including many of those on your list).

- Brent

Brent - I wish I had a scanner! I'd pop up my plan quicker than you can say 'fothergilla'. Same problem with pictures. I have a computer savvy household, but we don't keep up with all the toys. The way they explained it, they will be removing 3 inches of very weedy grass (ok mostly weeds). Beneath is fill (i.e. sand) so I thought the more topsoil mixed in the better. Does this make sense?

Most of the fill perennials will be taken from my current garden. I'm happy to save cost on that!

Right now I am mostly thinking about what should be next to what. Like how would the purple sedums look next to the Orange Carex? Also, do I have enough four season interest? Do any of the bigger plants have problems I am not anticipating? Have I correctly matched plants with site conditions, things like that. Thanks for the feedback. I'm always happy for more.

Lisa

Lisa

This is more a plant selection question than one of design, but obviously plant selection is a step in design. I just want to make the point that your success will depend on how well you maintain things by clipping, and on the structure, focal points, and framing you give your bed - that is to say, on how well you've done the rest of the design process.

I'm a big fan of crowded beds too (in the garden :-)) and try to take a layered approach - an upper and lower story of plants. It can also help to make it look good to create a bit of change of elevation with some rocks to make a raised area, or some planters placed among the plants, and so on.

KarinL