favorite plant combos - flowers or foliage

14 years ago

O. K. everyone. It's time to redo my flowerbed. It's 20' long. Already have a few plants in it that I want to keep - Max Frei geranium, maltese cross, east freisland salvia, blue hyssop, pink penstemon, white clips campanula. I was also planning on dividing a few perennials from my other bed and planting them in the 'newly made' bed. Had to get rid of some others because they started taking over. I would like to have both summer and fall colour. Doesn't matter if its flowers or foliage as long as they look good together, I know, everyone has their own favorites. The plants should not be over 4' (I hate staking, it's not a site I like to see in my garden), no more anemones - I already have 'Robitussimo' and it is pink, I have a tendency to lean towards pink, blue or purple, so I need other colors. I thought I'd try and get some new ideas from you guys. How about it? Marg

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Comments (8)

oilpainter
14 years ago
Try mating your friesland salvia with goblin gillardia. It's an orangish red daisy like flower with yellow tips and a brown center. The Salvia and gillardia's flowers are complimentary colors. Goblin's flower is about 3 to 4 inches across, the plant grows 12 inches tall--sometimes a bit taller. It's very winter hardy and blooma almost all summer--longer if you deadhead. I still have some blooming in my beds.

Other long bloomers that I have are moonbean and sunray coreopsis. Both are yellow and grow no bigger than 18 inches
ontnative
14 years ago
In a part shade bed, I have Eupatorium 'Little Joe' (pale, frosty pink) with Phlox paniculata Mrs. Pepper (medium pink with darker eye/no mildew) and Anemone hybr. 'Pamina' (dark pink double). These are all still blooming now and look very pretty together. I am not a "pink person" but this is a lovely combination for a "not-too-dry" spot.
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I also bought "Plant Combinations" from Fine Gardening. I loved it so much, I gave a good friend a copy, too. I've just planted the following combinations, so we'll have to wait and see how they turn out, but I love it when I put the photos together: Group 1 -- magenta (main color): Penstemon Garnet Coreopsis 'Heavens Gate' Rose Campion Agastache 'Red Fortune' Hypericum 'Albury Purple' Group 2 -- butterfly garden (right side): Rudbeckia fulgida v. sulvantii 'Goldstrum' Aster frikartii 'Moench' Echinacea purpurea Big Sky 'Sunset' Veronica 'Royal Candles' Hypericum x hidcote Group 3 -- butterfly garden (left side): Crocosmia 'Lucifer' Agastache 'Blue Fortune' Asclepias 'Hello Yellow' Ascelepias tuberosa Middle of the butterfly garden: Bronze fennel Miscanthus sinensis v. condensatus 'Cosmopolitan' Vitex
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Sprout, are you starting 'from scratch' with no plants or do you have some? If so it might help if you post which colors you have. IMO one can use many, many different combinations of colors as long as there is lots of green and white to mitigate the 'clashing'! That's part of the charm of cottage gardens. I love unusual combos such as GGG's orange, black, and magenta. This year I'm trying for some unusual combos in pots and so far have a large pot with Vancouver Centennial geranium (rusty red and lime green leaves with an orange flower), a geranium with an orange flower, & Northern Lights grass that is white/pink/green. Another pot has burgundy/red coleus, burgundy petunias, and burgundy/lime sweet potato vines. One thing I do generally in the perennial beds is to use paler colors in the near beds and brighter colors further away. In the beds closer to the house and front patio I use lots of pink, blue, white, various purples (mauve, lavender, violet, as well as deep purple), and further away more yellows, reds, burgundy, with white, and lots of green foliage. I'm now using bluish plants such as perennial flax, Jacob's Ladder, and eventually Walker's Low catmint throughout the garden to tie it all together and of course white and silver throughout. I use lime green plants (Lady's Mantle, Limelight Hydrangea, Limelight Artemesia) with deep purple often. IMO lime green looks good with purple, fuchsia, orange, or pale blue. Don't forget variegated or colored foliage plants also - they add a lot of dimension to the garden with or without flowers. I have variegated Jacob's Ladder as well as the plain green ones, many heuchera with various burgundy-tone leaves, different ninebarks with copper or purple leaves, variegated green/white dogwood shrubs, spirea with lime green leaves, bergenia has green foliage turning red in the fall, Limelight Artemesia with it's variegated lime/green foliage (this is a strong grower - I hack it back and keep it controlled). Then there are the silver foliage plants which can brighten up any space - lavender, silver artemesias, lamb's ears, dusty miller are one's I have. I know it's difficult to make choices when you are starting out, I recommend you make lists of your favorite plants and buy (or seed/propagate) a few every year. A color scheme may appear from that list.
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Irish, you don't say what your Sunset zone is so I don't know how these plants take frost. I'm in zone 17, coastal Northern CA (Oakland hills) so we get very few frost days. I like nice contrasty foliage combinations: chartreuse feverfew against dark green Rhaphiolepsis indica 'Ballerina' and feathery 'Johnson's Blue' geranium, for instance. Oxalis siliquosa ÂSunset Velvet' is beautiful (and non-invasive!) against Plectranthus, either the silver or purplish leafed varieties. You can see both these combinations on our Comcast website at the following URL (note: itÂs best to have broadband to access the Comcast site. However, the Yahoo direct link at the bottom is suitable for dial-up users): https://home.comcast.net/~j.komatsu/flower_photos2.htm (In the Flower Photos #2 group, the first shot is the feverfew combination. Click on the RH arrowhead button to reach the last photo, which is the oxalis/plectranthus combo) My Abutilon pictum 'Thompsonii' always looks best in the winter rains, although the cold really saps the Abutilon 'Savitzii'. Another beautiful plant is variegated Rhamnus, which has the added asset of being a relatively narrow vertical accent, which are very hard to find yet fit so well into our small urban gardens here in California. And if you have the room, Melianthus major has fabulous silver-green foliage! An absolutely outstanding, unusual foliage plant that brightens up our grey winter days is Lavatera olba 'Aureum'. It is a mallow, and the spikes of lavendar flowers are beautiful as well. The foliage is bright yellow fading gradually to chartreuse. It prefers a light to medium-sun situation, my front yard is west-facing and in summer it can get a bit toasted. Very drought resistant although scale can stress it in dry weather. Note that my property has very good drainage, so I don't know how it would react in clay soils. In the direct link at the bottom (our Yahoo album), in the set of two photos, you can see the chartreuse foliage best in the March 2004 photo. I regularly prune this plant down, it gets to a 4x4' mound. Looks great next to the purple-leafed Chinese Fringe Flower (Loropetalum chinense var. rubrum) I have next to it. Here is a link that might be useful:
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xaroline
14 years ago
Blue hyssop looks neat when paired with Iceland poppies.
They bloom together here.
aker
14 years ago
My favorite combo for a large planter is:

Plectranthus Troy's gold.
Coral Swirl Impatien.
Bright purple Impatiens.
One Canna Tropicana.
Coleus with brown and pink foliage.
ianna
14 years ago
Ont. Native, I like your idea of combining joe pye with phlox. I have some joe pye weed in teh backyard which I had paired up with coneflowers and rudbeckia and ornamental grass. However I was thinking that the coneflower and Joe pye weed is not working out and was planning to remove the coneflowers. I have a phlox davidii elsewhere which I could pair up with the pye weed.

My favorite combination is my cordonna sage with lady's mantle. Coneflowers with my tall ornamental grasses. Dill with calendula and drumstick allium. Lady's mantle with lamb's ears.
halaeva
14 years ago
Hi;
How about: Miscanthus Sinensis,Canna Pretoria,Roses,Oriental Lilies,Hardy Hibiscus (dinner plate-short variety),Peony,Oriental Popy, Campanula Glomerata Superba,Hostas,Dusty Millers,Amaranthus, Dahlias. I Can see these plant on your flower bed.
Hala.
marricgardens
Original Author
14 years ago
These are some wonderful combinations, and reminders! I have a holding bed where I put plants I don't know where to place permanently.
Hala - your post reminded me that I have campanula Superba. I also have the oriental poppy 'Angels Choir'. Now I know where they will go.
Ianna - I have gotten more varieties of coneflower thru trades. I may put some in the bed.
Aker - I hadn't thought of to many annuals in there, but coleus would be a great idea.
xaroline - I also love the idea of poppies with the blue hyssop.
Ontnative - I alread have Miss Pepper phlox in that bed and I have a pink anemone. Just to let you know Miss Pepper has been here 6 years and gotten mildew once. Never thought of them togther.
Oilpainter - I'm not a fan of gallardias but I like the idea of that colour combo. Any ideas for another type of flower to put in front of the salvia?
Thanks for the great ideas everyone. Keep them coming, it's a large bed! Marg
oilpainter
14 years ago
Goblin gillardia is one of my favorites. It's very hardy, blooms all summer, is showy and bugs seldom bother it. I have it tucked into most of my beds.

However to each his own. Another suggestion is Heuchera 'Creme Brulee'. Lovely bright bronze foliage on this coral bells that would offset the dark blue and green leaves of the salvia

favorite plant combos - flowers or foliage

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oilpainter

ontnative

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aker

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favorite plant combos - flowers or foliage

Comments (8)

oilpainter

ontnative

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aker

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