I love and collect clematis of all sorts as their generally light airy habit makes them ideal to grow up and over other plants without swamping the host and giving two shows in the place where I would normally have only one. A heavy winter prune will keep nearly all of them in order. This …
This has to be one of the great perfumed shrubs and tough as they come. It flowers in the autumn and the tiny white blossoms perfume the surrounds with what I think is the scent of ripe apricots! The foliage is rich green and somewhat holly like in the plants youth but as it ages …
This is a much neglected evergreen soft wooded shrub from South America that could find a place in any moist semi-shaded spot in your garden. It grows to about 1metre tall and will in time make a small suckering clump. It produces its mauve, purple spotted and yellow tongued flowers in clusters during the early …
I love this Genus, there is so much that Viburnums can do in the garden. Some are evergreen with bold foliage, some deciduous with great autumn colour, some are grown for scent or berries, branch structure or of course stunning showy flowers. If you collected the whole Genus it is so diverse that it wouldn’t …
This is supposed to be the rarest maple in the wild coming from a very small area in China and only collected and then raised in the west a couple of times so that all cultivated plants come from much the same original material. Apart from rarity why grow it? Certainly it has proved to …
If you hanker after a cut leafed Japanese maple but can’t have one due to climatic constraints then perhaps this is the plant for you. It is a hardy deciduous shrub to 1.5metres tall and wide with foliage so fine that from a distance it looks like green smoke! and it has clusters of tiny …
Something less like the ubiquitous African Violet would seem almost impossible but this South American trailing evergreen shrub is in fact in the same family. It will trail across the ground, grow up anything it is tried to or make an interesting hanging basket subject if you are into such things (I find they dry …
I have a love hate relationship with Lilacs I love the flowers but in general hate the bush. They are one week wonders and scruffy for most of the time. Sorry if I have offended anyone! What I would like is to have friends with lots of well established bushes that would kindly give me …
This has to be the ultimate plant for dry shade, in fact it will grow in the driest and darkest shade you can find so anywhere that almost no other plant will survive will be ideal for this one! It is in fact an evergreen perennial to about 1metre tall that acts more like a …
If you are looking for something a bit different for your garden then perhaps this vegetable version of “Cousin It” from the Adams Family could be just the ticket! It is a weeping form of Norway Spruce and will trail along the ground or spill over a bank unless trained up a stake. It can …