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Plant suggestions welcome

(31 Posts)
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MaizieD Tue 03-Nov-15 14:22:50

I'm currently doing some voluntary work helping to restore a garden. it has four large quadrant beds which can be viewed from all sides. The original suggestion was that they were planted up with just roses but (being an awkward old woman) I thought it would look a bit 'municipal' and suggested that we mix roses with easy care perennials and low growing evergreen shrubs to give some winter interest. So, of course, I've been asked to suggest some. The soil is neglected heavy clay which we are working to improve but it will take a year or two (or maybe longer sad). We're in the North East. We don't have much money for plants.

Does anyone have any ideas for plants to accompany the roses. We are planning to have bush roses and obelisks of climbers in the centre of the bed so I think we need plants low enough not to compete with them.

So far I've thought of low growing 'mound forming' hebes, companulas, sedum spectabile, nepeta, perennial geranuims, cistus, phlox and hardy penstomen.

Struggling for smallish evergreen shrubs and I'm sure there must be many more good mannered perennials but my mind's a blank! Any suggestions would be much appreciated smile

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whitewave Wed 04-Nov-15 21:31:00

Also have a dry shade area which drives me mad anyone got some good suggestions?

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stillhere Wed 04-Nov-15 23:43:26

Dryoptera ferns, smaller less invasive periwinkles, the white form looks good in shade, Japanese anemones, foxgloves, alchemilla mollis, aquilegia, brunnera, cyclamen hederifolium, euphorbias, If there's a wall then winter flowering jasmine is excellent, heucheras are very tolerant of dry shade, asters are pretty good, especially the species ones, bergenias, epimediums, hardy geraniums are good, some forms more than others but my memory at this time of night isn't good! The ones with smaller pink flowers. Nodosum, that's it. There's a very good lamium, a white-leaved form. Tellima - not particularly striking but there is a cultivar of the grandiflora that is good, forest frost.

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shodatin Thu 05-Nov-15 00:12:26

My best rose under-planting has been dwarf lavender, including a few later-flowering, and easy to take cuttings to increase stock. Suggest old coffee-grounds as free fertilizer, amazing for roses.

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MaizieD Thu 05-Nov-15 13:19:40

We had a meeting this morning with the professional gardner who is helping us. We've agreed to start with the roses and look to try and build up a stock of plants over the summer ready to underplant in the autumn. What we need now is an idea of just how many plants we'll need for all the beds. I can forsee that we will need to do some industrial scale propagation and growing on...

We've 300sq metres to plant up - that's one hell of a lot of coffee drinking grin

For the dry shade, how about hardy cyclamen? You can get autumn and spring flowering varieties with lots of interesting leaf markings and they will self seed very happily. I love them. And, if your shade isn't from evergreens, spring bulbs which will flower before the shade plants get their leaves.

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Daddima Sun 24-Jan-16 16:01:03

Good stuff from Stillhere!

We had hostas, but the Old Man would like them replaced by something which;

1). Comes up every year

2). Won't grow too big/ take over the garden

3). Will be nice and colourful

4). Wouldn't need perfect soil

He's not looking for much, is he?

We already have some nice fuchsias, and I'd be inclined to pop in a few more.

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