Carol Klein on her stars of the season
Here’s my pick of some unforgettable plants I’ve come across on my recent garden travels
‘Around every corner new autumnal sights greet you’
For me, this autumn has been packed with wondrous plants. Having been in the enviable position of visiting several brilliant gardens where talented and inspiring gardeners ply their trade, there have been treats galore. I’d love to share just a few of the plants I’ve been lucky enough to encounter on my travels. It’s hard to choose, but here goes.
At Gloucestershire’s Hidcote Manor in mid-October, the most captivating sight of all was a host of Crocus speciosus pushing up through the grass, their purple chalices open to the sun. The glorious reds and oranges of the cherry leaves had fallen among them, making an unforgettable picture.
Autumn crocus are easy to grow. Plant their corms in grass with a bulb planter or in a bed where it’s best to grow them through ground cover to hide their bare legs and prevent them tumbling over.
At Gravetye Manor, Sussex, there was almost too much to choose from in the Flower Garden, which was originally planted by William Robinson, whose garden this was and who wrote The English Flower Garden.
Most unforgettable was a sage, salvia ‘Phyllis’ Fancy’, which was used intermittently along the length of a bed that borders the long track below the garden. It makes a large shrub (but is tender) with lavender flowers, tipped in white, and a fluffy greyness to leaves and flowers. In the evening light, alongside pale Michaelmas daisies, it took my breath away. It’s easy to grow and to increase from cuttings.
Where to start at Great Dixter, again in Sussex? Apart from beds full of seedling dahlias in a kaleidoscopic range of colours, there were zinnias galore, huge constructions like Rumanian
haystacks built with pruned and fallen wood from the garden and covered in nasturtiums. Fergus and his team practise a live-and-let-live policy within the garden that has paid huge dividends in terms of the diversity of wildlife.
Trees, both ancient and modern, and shrubs galore in the most poetic setting, were the standout elements at Gresgarth, Lady Arabella Lennox-Boyd’s North Lancashire garden. At the foot of a bridge that crosses the rushing beck, which separates the more cultivated and designed garden from the wilder reaches, is a stachyurus with an enormous yew at its back.
When we saw it in spring it was dripping with ribbons of pale lemon flowers. It’s trying to flower for a second time but you hardly notice because you’re in complete awe of its autumn colour, rich ruby reds, russetts, crimson and orange. Truly breathtaking!
Further south at Ashwood Nurseries in the West Midlands in John’s Garden, every corner and bed has something to offer and it’s the combinations of plants that are the most striking, golden grasses, amber cornus, aruncus in ochre and pink. Around every corner new autumnal sights greet you. See What’s looking good now? (below) to read about his nerines.
Back at home, our acer ‘Ōsakazuki’ greets me dressed in its best autumn garb. My garden is looking rather tired and neglected at the moment but this beautiful tree my mum gave us shines out, its leaves painted in crimson.