My plans, it turned out, were naïve. My small, thin box of a garden was to have a simple palette of dark-green bones with occasional flashes of white. The ‘bones’ were yew, ivy and hornbeam. The white flashes were to be Ammi majus, cosmos and roses. I ordered an avalanche of snow-white brunnera, some climbing roses and a pair of white Paeonia rockii from a trusted specialist, and waited.
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My careful plans started to unravel as soon as some of those white brunnera turned out to be blue and the roses sported distinctly yellow buds before the white petals unfolded. To rub salt into the wound, the peonies took three years to flower and their four voluptuous, ball-gown blossoms showed up as a rather loud magenta. The white garden was clearly beyond this amateur gardener.
And yet I do fail, annually. I could write my disasters off for good, but what to do when you love something so much?
I moved on, slightly embarrassed, to an early summer palette of apricot, orange and deep wine-red. The introduction of colour was going well until I was seduced by pink roses with names as sweet as their perfume and realised I had also inherited my father’s love of carnival-coloured dahlias; a mixture that even in the most careful of horticultural hands could look like a nursery school’s playroom.
Getting colour right (whatever that may mean) is somehow more crucial in a small garden because there are no corners to turn. Your eye has no choice but to take in the entire garden, successes and mistakes, in one glance. The brick walls of the house are painted a rusty orange, which would be the perfect backdrop for burgundy-petalled Rosa ‘Souvenir du Docteur Jamain’ and Dahlia ‘Chat Noir’. Yet I remain in a constant dilemma about how far to go with introducing colour into what is a rather uptight garden. ‘Apricot, white, deep wine-red’ has become something of a personal garden mantra, but also a belt that feels tighter by the year; but then, don’t they all?
Will this be the summer I finally have raindrops sitting in the folds of my hosta leaves, or can I see the slugs unfurling their napkins?
Should this be the summer I let in a little yellow or purple, already so successful in spring? Perhaps in the form of Achillea filipendulina ‘Gold Plate’ or the nostalgic Aster x frikartii ‘Mönch’. Sadly, the sight of purple and yellow within six feet of each other makes this gardener queasy. I am now leaning in the direction of the richer ochre and purple tones of Achillea ‘Inca Gold’ and Aster amellus ‘King George’. But still I worry.
I am learning that the colour choices that please and those that grate are often only a few spins of the colour wheel away from one another. The welcome hue of a wild primrose or Rosa banksiae is just a short jump from the rather strident Primula ‘Showstopper Yellow’ or Rosa ‘Arthur Bell’, both of which I would probably be tempted to ‘deadhead’ while still in bud. And why is it I have such deep affection for Rosa Graham Thomas (= ‘Ausmas’) or the trusty Dahlia ‘David Howard’, yet cannot countenance Dahlia ‘Penhill Yellow Queen’? I am wondering too, why do bold and bright dahlias get let off the hook so easily, like naughty children allowed to run riot in the library? Screeching yellow aside, the dahlias’ exuberance is always welcome.
Getting colour right (whatever that may mean) is somehow more crucial in a small garden because there are no corners to turn.
The application of more colour is right at the top of my ever- increasing garden ‘to do’ list, but not far behind is my second dilemma, the ‘let’s try again’ list: plants that I would love to have here but that have previously not worked. Is it worth having another go, I ask myself. The collection contains many all-time favourites, including the Benton irises, single hollyhocks, martagon lilies, lupins and hostas, and curiously, even phlox and asters – all usually reliable, but ones that have let me down time and again. Failing with Michaelmas daisies feels rather like a life-long cook admitting they can’t make a Victoria sponge.
And yet I do fail, annually. I could write my disasters off for good, but what to do when you love something so much? The soft, powdery scent of phlox is such an integral ingredient of my happiest childhood memories and I am frustrated at my own lack of success in growing it, especially as it is hardly a troublesome plant for most gardeners. I can’t help thinking that maybe this will be the year phlox ‘Monica Lynden-Bell’ has a change of heart and decides my urban space is the place for her.
But there is a reason to ‘have another go’. The garden has subtly changed over time, and change brings opportunities. Last winter’s removal of a large part of my towering Robinia pseudoacacia ‘Frisia’ and its soft, spreading canopy has delivered new light into a previously dark patch of garden, providing an opportunity for sun-loving plants that hadn’t worked before. Even more reason to experiment with a pale crocosmia, or perhaps Oenothera lindheimeri with its swaying, pink-and-white butterfly flowers.
And I must have one more go with my horticultural nemesis. I’ve probably shed more tears over hostas than any other garden plant. Every time I introduce their softly rippled, blue-green leaves, they are savaged by slugs within hours, despite the latest ‘miracle’ preventative of egg shells, coffee grounds or expensively introduced nematodes. I am excited by the thought of Hosta ‘Halcyon’, which I have never grown before. But before I get carried away, I remember that similar cultivars have previously been treated as a running buffet by every slug and snail in the neighbourhood. Will this be the summer I finally have deep raindrops sitting in the folds of my perfect hosta leaves, or can I see the slugs unfurling their napkins already? “Come on everyone, he’s having another go. Dinner is served.”
