extended bed 2015

IT looks great and a job well done! Can't wait to see how you plant it out :)

I think my digging is probably better than my design ability Dan! It now has a dwarf lilac, a few cyclamen, some Irises from Siris and a couple of fuchsias. Waiting to see what inspiration will strike - lots on the wish list but no visual imagination...

I'm pretty much the same! I know the size and the shape of the border I'm creating. I'll plant a few things.. Then I'll just stick anything in with it all. I'm currently doing that with a border that spans the length of the garden on one side which separates the garden to the public footpath next to it.

A blank canvas, what a wonderful thought. I'll bet that was hard work too. I love an island bed where you can get all round without treading things down and I can't wait to see it filled up.

Yes it was quite hard work, but it was spread over several days. I'm just hoping that in the non-artistic versus love of plants competition there will be a reasonable winner. At all events there will be a bit less grass to cut - but heck, more edges to trim...

Soil looks good, crumbly and reasonably dry. Well done, nice shape. Suggest you put the Iris on the side that keeps the sun the longest, the rhizomes do like to sunbathe.

Iris are now in Siris. The bed runs north-south and all gets full sun until about four o'clock. The shadow from the tree doesn't reach them. Most of the irises are on the left (East) side - only one on the West side. All have the rhizomes on the South side so all I can do now is wait and see...I think some of the labels have blown away but that won't affect the colour of the flowers...

Hi Sue, it looks very similar to the 1 that I dug last autumn, except that yours is a bit more kidney shaped, mine is just straight with rounded ends, mine also runs north to south, but the south end gets shade from the trees outside my garden, Derek.

Hi Sue, it looks very similar to the bed I dug out last autumn, {and double dug} but yours is a bit more kidney shaped, mine just has straight sides with rounded ends, it runs north to south as well, but part of the southern end gets shaded by the trees outside my garden, Derek.

Hi Sue, it looks very similar to the bed I dug out last autumn, {and double dug} but yours is a bit more kidney shaped, mine just has straight sides with rounded ends, it runs north to south as well, but part of the southern end gets shaded by the trees outside my garden, Derek.

Sorry about all the posts Sue, my laptop seems to be playing up a bit, 1 minute the post isn't there, then there's 2, which both disappear, now 3, Derek.

Oh computers, they drive you nuts don't they? Wow, I only double dug part of a bed once and once was enough!
The curve of the bed was intended to follow the curve on the other side of the grass, to make a sort of inviting pathway - that was the idea anyway. There are mature sycamores on the west side - you can see the shadow approaching as it was late afternoon. The bright green little tree on the right behind that small pink fuchsia (take my word for it!) is Magnolia Stellata and the tree at the end of the new bed is the damson I have had so much trouble with. Right at the bottom in front of the hedge are a dwarf Viburnum opulus and Hypericum Hidcote.

I would like to have a bed that size to plant up, being a plantaholic, but though we could cut a shape out of the lawn, the garden is already tiny. Him Indoors wants things kept simple so that mowing is quick and he hasn't got too much to trim and manoeuvre round. Until I have to do the mowing I have given in. We downsized to a smaller garden anyway but I wasn't expecting quite this small! We'll get there.

We had a lively discussion about mowing when I suggested I might do this and we compromised on the original design by rounding the ends more so the mower would go round more easily- we even did trials to make sure it would! And I do the edge trimming - there would have been a revolution if he was the trimmer as there's such a lot to do already.
When you have a very small lawn though it probably looks better without cutting a bed into it anyway - you can always sneak the lawn back a bit by degrees and widen the bed at the side. This can easily be justified if he notices by the argument that there will be less lawn to cut...

Yes, he has agreed to make the borders a bit wider and possibly shape them more than they are already. That will do for me.

I don't trim the edges because I have such weak hands and arms, nor do I do any heavy stuff. What are men for after all?

Lol...

That looks like a promising start! With the plants you have put in it should look very nice during the summer!

Have you thought of putting anything in for winter colour, like Deadwoods, for example?

I'm looking forward to seeing photos when the plants you've already put in have grown & are flowering!

I lovely sized bed.........it'll look great in the summer, I'm sure!

Did you mean dogwoods Balcony? I wasn't thinking of putting any tallish shrubs in it for now. Not having any ability to visualise I tend to go by trial and error but am then too soft hearted to throw out the errors...
There are some good purple crocuses and some prims out now at the bottom end but the part that's bare in the pic is still rather sparse. Siris kindly sent me some nice bearded irises but as they are young ones I don't suppose they will flower for a year or two yet. I've got one or two fuchsias that will probably end up there, and a day lilly that's just been moved from the wrong place but no idea what the fillers will be yet. Winter colour needs thinking about - I hadn't got that far! Needs to be something tough as our Novembers are unspeakable with horizontal nonstop rain... possibly yet another Euonymus...

Haha. There's a veg plot for them....but thanks for the thought!

What a wonderful planting opportunity, Sue! I'm also in the process of filling a new 'bare' patch . . . so far, a Pittosporum, Sambucus nigra, Hellebores, Omphalodes, and - waiting their turn - 3 Hakonechloa macra, a dark pink and a white perennial Geranium and a pink Phlox.
What fun we're having - I love this time of year :))

You're doing better than me - I'm still deciding. I would love a Pittosporum but I haven't got a sheltered corner. And any anyway, how to choose which one? I had to look up the Hakonechloa macra - very pretty! I have a Russian sage planted close to a pale orange crocosmia and I hope they will mingle but I'm hastening slowly...

Hastening slowly sounds a good plan Sue . . .
(my turn to look something up - Russian sage? is that Perovskia???) If so, what a gorgeous blue, and it will look great with the crocosmia :)

That's the one. I was hoping to find a dwarf one but the ones I found were a bit chunky and I wanted a dainty one.
I saw a photo of the two together and they did look lovely.

I've seen a Perovskia on Crocus called 'little spire' (looks about knee height), but £7.99 seems a lot for one plant . . . unless it's exactly what you want, I suppose?!

I think that must be the one I'd seen. Trouble is there's carriage on top of that. So the solution must be to buy something else at the same time - I got a new Crocus catalogue only yesterday!

Hi Sue, yes I got a Crocus catalogue yesterday as well, you're right, the best thing to do is make a long list, and order everything at the same time, and just pay 1 delivery charge, it's a lot cheaper than Burncoose, the more you spend there, the more postage you have to pay, Derek.

I usually love Crocus, but in that catalogue they're selling "Anthriscus sylvestris" for £6.99 . . . otherwise known as Cow Parsley!

Sorry about the mistake, Stera! You are quite right - it was DOGWOOD not DEADWOOD! :-D) :-D) :-D)

Hi Stera I 'm always way behind on pics so only just found this, I was wondering if you have ever checked out Spritz's blogs I remember her doing a new bed long time back, it was fabulous, in fact my youngest had a massive garden in those days and we copied her design, as you do, if you are interested and would like some ideas the blogs were written 2009 started her project in June and showed us its progress all through summer and into October..
Well done on the work digging out the bed, I nearly forgot that bit, lol.. and whatever you do decide, enjoy filling it up and I'm sure it will look grand....

I bought "Garden Answers" for the first time yesterday, (luckily I had a voucher for £2.35 off, lol!) , May issue, and it's packed with inspiration. My fave was a mass of blue, white and purples, which I'm going to try and emulate :)

Will also try to send you a PM.

Sheila, this week I found a Little Blue Spire at our small local nursery, and also a pale lemon Leucanthemum, so if they flower at the same time as the crocosmia it should be quite nice.

I love blue flowers too - in fact once did a blog called All the blues.
Lincs I might just have a look at those blogs Spritz wrote - thanks for the info. I can't do design though, more plant it and see what it looks like... The little dwarf lilac I got from Jacksons has come through the winter but its very small so I don't know how long the wait for flowers will be. One of the fuchsias I planted in the autumn appears to have died - it was Winston Churchill which I read somewhere was hardy, but obviously not hardy enough unless it springs a surprise later - its early days, but the other two in the same bed are sprouting. It will probably cry out for rearranging next year but probably won't get it...

Just seen again your comment about the cow parsley - if you want any lol, our top lawn is being invaded by it as we didn't strim the bank in time and its seeded into the grass...

You are very welcome Stera, I tell myself every year that I am going to make changes and go for colour coordination and themes in various beds and borders, change the layout because its too square and all that lot but it never happens and to be honest I like my garden, it is designed,mine, it is coordinated, everything in two's instead of fives or sevens, two lawns, two ponds and two g' houses, even two dogs, lol...

Glad you found a Little Spire, and it will look great with lemon Leucanthemum. I LOVE the fuchsia Winston Churchill but sadly it does need protection (thick mulch and sheltered spot) during colder months :((

Ah well Sheila, I could always just plant another Dollar Princess and bleach the flowers....perhaps not.

Oh Lincs, my plants are mostly in odd numbers - one of each....you have more room for different ones that way even though it doesn't look as good. I had to laugh at your co-ordination in twos. Mine's not co-ordinated at all, except the combination of blue anemones and Magnolia Stellata which is my great joy at this time of year. I did try one year to go for lemon and blue and it did work at first until a bright orange calendula appeared in it and I lost heart and let it get on with things on its own. A harder woman than me would have moved it or - shock horror - thrown it out but that's not me.

Hi

Have you a update with what you have done so far ?

Intrigued

Gg

Well yes, but I'm not very pleased with it. After all the trouble I had finding a dwarf Perovskia it turned out that I should have had the tall one. I put in some cosmos as a filler for this year and it has grown much too tall and overshadowed everything else - and then half if it blew over in the wind. And the leucanthemum was completely stripped by the snails so i don't expect it will recover. Took me ages to find a lemon one too. .

The crocosmia is fantastic, a really lovely light orange, but everything else tends to fuchsia colours and it clashes. I said I was no good at design. Back to the drawing board.

thanks for the update, all trial and error.....

Especially error this year... Never mind, onwards and upwards. I'm quite looking forward to taking the cosmos out but can't brink myself to do it before its finished flowering..

Here is what i think... You should decide if you want the casual free look, or the more formal. Think that formal is actually easier.Freeform, you can remove and improve...

Oh its casual every time. Never been any good at formal - you can't hide your accidents...