Tales from Titchmarsh

Whether your favourite plant is on trend or not, you should grow what you like, says Alan – even if it is a pink and white-leaved willow

Taste is a funny thing. After all, one man’s meat is another man’s poison. Or, to put it another way, one man’s fish is another man’s poisson. Try as we might, we all have our little prejudices when it comes to horticulture. I recall several years ago endeavouring to explain to Germaine Greer that there really is no legitimate reason to believe that French marigolds are beyond the pale. She simply could not believe that anyone with an ounce of good taste would have any truck with them. “They’re common,” she insisted. I countered that the French marigold was a bright little flower, easy to grow and flowering from one end of summer to the other. Bees love it and planted at the foot of your tomato plants it will help to repel whitefly: five good reasons to be admiring of this obliging little plant. She would have none of it – as far as she was concerned the French marigold was never likely to feature in the garden of anyone who considers themselves an arbiter of good taste.

It’s absurd when you think about it. So, what makes a plant fashionable? Subtlety is, I suppose, a must. Any flower daring enough to be brilliant of colour and lavish in its floral generosity is likely to be spurned by those who prefer their blooms to be rather less forward in their attractions. But then tulips are bright and easy to grow, and they are HUGELY fashionable. Maybe their goblet-shaped flowers have sufficient elegance to make them acceptable, whereas the doubleflowered begonia will have the tastemakers rushing for a bucket.

Shrub roses are fashionable, bush roses are common. French marigolds common, pot marigolds – calendulas – quite acceptable. Gladioli are acceptable in the form of Gladiolus byzantinus, but the larger-flowered Dame Edna kind belong in church arrangements and certainly not in the garden of anyone with an ounce of self respect. These are not my opinions, you understand, merely accepted wisdom among the cognoscenti, whoever they are.

Perhaps associations colour our judgement. In the same way that we would never consider christening a child with the name of someone we heartily disliked, then in similar vein we are unlikely to admire a plant that was cherished by someone we consider NOS (Not Our Sort). We infinitely prefer to grow hellebores and hostas, Hydrangea

‘Annabelle’, eucryphia and honeysuckle – things that are revered by PLU (People Like Us).

Is it simply snobbery? Not exactly. I think it’s rather more complex than that. I freely admit that there is no logical reason why I should dislike Photinia ‘Red Robin’ quite as much as I do. It has rich-red spring growth that brightens up many a suburban boundary hedge. Eughh! Give me rich-green privet any day.

Similarly, I struggle to love Physocarpus ‘Diabolo’, whose foliage is the colour of mud, and that nasty little willow with foliage of pink and white that scorches at the first hint of wind/rain/bright sunshine and which simply romps out of the door at BBC Gardeners’ World Live. You see, I’m as guilty as the next man or woman when it comes to pet hates and groundless pronouncements.

The gardeners I most admire are those who grow what they love without giving a thought to the sensibilities of others. A tiny front garden stuffed with brilliant summer bedding in all shades of the rainbow will lift my spirits. Yellow forsythia and raspberry-pink flowering currant brighten my springs. Plants that are well grown, lovingly tended and clearly enjoyed by their owners are worth more than rubies.

We’ve all come to realise over the past year that gardens have a major role to play in our continued mental health. If that means growing largeflowered bright-red begonias and vivid-orange French marigolds, then fair enough. I will not hear a word said against them.

The gardeners I most admire are those who grow what they love without giving a thought to the sensibilities of others