Pink perfection

Japanese anemones will fill your borders with elegant blooms on wiry stems, alongside the fleshy, flat-top pink flowers of hylotelephium

You really can’t go wrong with this easy autumnal duo. If anything, Japanese anemones make themselves a little bit too much at home – thriving in shade, partshade and heavy clay. They ask for very little apart from the odd drink of water in a dry spell. This pretty semi-double pink cultivar is Anemone hybrida ‘Serenade’ (H80cm/32in, S90cm/3ft), flowering August-October. Sedums are another easy plant for October. This one is hylotelephium ‘Matrona’, which has deep burgundybronze foliage and stems, topped with flat pink umbellifer blooms. Also flowering August-October, in full sun or part shade, these good-natured plants stand well over winter, too (H75cm/30in, S30cm/12in). See p28 for more on growing hylotelephiums