We all process major events in our lives in our own way. I’m a gardener, part time garden designer, and plants rule a lot of my life. In the immediate aftermath of June 23rd I was busy moving house. The combination of national and domestic chaos was reflected in the unpacked boxes in my house and the weeds sprouting in my own and my clients’ gardens. It is only now, with autumn upon us, and the weeds at last bowing to the cold of winter, that I can think of processing my feelings in the way I know best, with plants.
I term what I feel as grief, because grief to me encompasses all the emotions I feel - anger, sadness, and a sort of dogged determination to be like the resistance fighters of old, hiding my priest in the priest’s hole, my Jewish family in the attic. Of course I am no such hero and my protests are those of a shy, quiet, middle aged woman who is largely invisible to the world. But through plants I can create something startling and vivid that shouts to the world - “Stand Up! Look! Fight!”
I was sitting with my bulb catalogues, ordering the hundreds of bulbs as I do each year for my clients, to make their winter pots blaze throughout the drab winter months. And I thought...how about gold and blue, for a change? Would anyone notice? Could this be my own, silent, protest...?
So, friends, this is what I recommend if you also want to follow this route.
For a really early display, yellow aconites (eranthis hyemalis) and blue iris reticulata...this will give you colour in February.
We are getting a little late for planting daffodils now (I am still planting them, but I am always late) but if can quickly plant some small native daffodils, such as the wild welsh daffodil (Pseudo Narcissi Obvallaris), which I have paired with blue anemones (Anemone Blanda Violet Star) for an early display in March.
Hyacinth Blue Pearl, which flowers outdoors March-April, would look wonderful in a pot surrounded by yellow scented wallflowers (Erysimum cheiri), flowering March to May.
November is traditionally the best month for planting tulips. How about Bellona - a deep golden yellow tulip, height 30 cm so won’t be too tall in a pot, flowers mid April? Pair them with muscari (grape hyacinths), also flowing in April, and you’ve got your yellow stars on a blue background....
Once the seed catalogues thump through the letterbox in the next couple of months we can start planning yellow and blue vegetable plots, cutting gardens, summer pots, herbaceous borders...Remainer gardeners, show your true colours!
Teresa@TBBGardenDesigns
I term what I feel as grief, because grief to me encompasses all the emotions I feel - anger, sadness, and a sort of dogged determination to be like the resistance fighters of old, hiding my priest in the priest’s hole, my Jewish family in the attic. Of course I am no such hero and my protests are those of a shy, quiet, middle aged woman who is largely invisible to the world. But through plants I can create something startling and vivid that shouts to the world - “Stand Up! Look! Fight!”
I was sitting with my bulb catalogues, ordering the hundreds of bulbs as I do each year for my clients, to make their winter pots blaze throughout the drab winter months. And I thought...how about gold and blue, for a change? Would anyone notice? Could this be my own, silent, protest...?
So, friends, this is what I recommend if you also want to follow this route.
For a really early display, yellow aconites (eranthis hyemalis) and blue iris reticulata...this will give you colour in February.
We are getting a little late for planting daffodils now (I am still planting them, but I am always late) but if can quickly plant some small native daffodils, such as the wild welsh daffodil (Pseudo Narcissi Obvallaris), which I have paired with blue anemones (Anemone Blanda Violet Star) for an early display in March.
Hyacinth Blue Pearl, which flowers outdoors March-April, would look wonderful in a pot surrounded by yellow scented wallflowers (Erysimum cheiri), flowering March to May.
November is traditionally the best month for planting tulips. How about Bellona - a deep golden yellow tulip, height 30 cm so won’t be too tall in a pot, flowers mid April? Pair them with muscari (grape hyacinths), also flowing in April, and you’ve got your yellow stars on a blue background....
Once the seed catalogues thump through the letterbox in the next couple of months we can start planning yellow and blue vegetable plots, cutting gardens, summer pots, herbaceous borders...Remainer gardeners, show your true colours!
Teresa@TBBGardenDesigns
eranthis hyemalis By H. Krisp (Own work) [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
By Emőke Dénes (kindly granted by the author) [CC BY-SA 2.5 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons
By Emőke Dénes (kindly granted by the author) [CC BY-SA 2.5 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons
Mick Lobb [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
By Magnus Manske (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
By Magnus Manske (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
By Kranchan (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) or FAL], via Wikimedia Commons
By No machine-readable author provided. Hans B.~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims). [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
By No machine-readable author provided. Hans B.~commonswiki assumed (based on copyright claims). [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons