Want a Garden Overflowing With Vivid Colours – Read On!

I walk in the garden, I look at the flowers and shrubs and trees and discover in them an exquisiteness of contour, a vitality of edge, or a vigour of spring, as well as an infinite variety of colour that no artefact I have seen in the last sixty years can rival...each day, as I look, I wonder where my eyes were yesterday.

Bernard Berenson

I don’t do many posts on gardening but recently I felt I could do more with my outside space to make it more, “usable” so, I’ve just had my garden redesigned & reconstructed to include a large area of decking. Subsequently, I thought I’d give you a glimpse into some of my favourite shrubs that have either been replanted or newly introduced into Jardin Figueroa!

I love shrubs because they’re hardy, they require minimal maintenance and there is such a wide variety relative to leaf shape and colour as well as the fact they can have the most beautiful flowers!

There’s one shrub that always draws comment and enquiry when guests peruse my garden and that is Physocarpus opulifolius. I do love the “Dart’s Gold” variety, whose bright green-gold leaves are a delight in spring but they fade to a plainer green in summer, that’s when the “Lady in Red” vatiety starts living up to its sexy Chris de Burgh name. The young crimson serrated foliage deepens to burgundy as the season goes on, with flat pink flowers to boot! The Lady in Red dances beautifully in the sunshine, or I should say it would dance in the sunshine if indeed we actually got any!

Abelia is one of those shrubs you don’t even notice until suddenly it’s in flower laden with happy bees enjoying its tubular pink and white scented flowers. You can get fancy varieties, but it won’t surprise you to know I only grow the simple grandiflora, Summerdream variety. There is actually no real “grandi” about their “flora”; they have pretty, small flowers, but this shrub has the neat trick of remaining attractive through the autumn by retaining the bright calyces on the stems once the flowers have fallen.

I do love a Lavatera! More of a sub shrub however, what generous flowerers they are! I grow various varieties including the richly-coloured Clementi “Burgundy Wine” which is good enough to have been awarded an RHS Award of Garden Merit. As far as I can see, you can be as brutal as you like with these shrubs. They seem to thrive on a crazily hard pruning in spring. Pass me the secateurs. Tiny word of warning though: the stems are brittle, so cut them back by half after they’ve flowered to stop the wind damaging the plant.

No way I’m going to leave this topic without a shout-out for Hibiscus! I’m not talking about the tender tropical species though, just the Syriacus varieties that will get through an average UK winter fairly confidently. Everything from sophisticated chic singles to over-the-top ruffles and flounces can be had in the range of varieties. My personal fave at the moment? The Syriacus Hamabo “rose of Sharon” variety – stunningly beautiful with it’s variegated pink and white flowers!

The term “Summer Shrub” seems to have fallen out of favour at the moment but I’ll always remember my dad talk about his shrubs using the term and it’s kinda stuck, one of my faves looks rather inanimate for 11 months of the year with its stark outline and steely green leaves but when Acca sellowiana, or feijoa, or even pineapple guava, does pop open its curiously arresting flowers you simply have to stop and wonder at them!

My next offering is actually a kind hibiscus thingy, but is a much more refined and unadulterated species native to Australia. I first saw Alogyne Huegelii, “Santa Cruz” on a Chelsea show garden a few years back and have coveted it ever since. It flowers literally from April to October but be warned, I just about manage to grow it in the slightly warmer temperatures of Southern England however, much cooler than this and it won’t survive.

Another fave is Pomegranate, Punica Granita, whose bright little leaves dancing in the sunshine would be reason enough to grow it, but last year I also had several lovely red flowers I’ve not tried this however a pro-gardener friend of mine assures me that if I move the pot into a small polytunnel in late summer the exaggerated heat through the autumn may encourage it to produce edible fruits!

I have very high hopes for one of my new ones, Mahonia Oiwakensis Lomariifolia, I have to be honest, I didn’t really take notice of the growing conditions but I was totally sold on the picture of the beautiful, vivid yellow flowers so, I was a little relieved to find out when I took the time to read about it that’s it’s a particularly hardy variety, phew!

There is very little chance my pro-gardener friend, will approve of my next, very popular recommendation– hydrangeas, (another shrub that has fallen out of favour recently)! However, I love them and here’s why, where to start? Apart from the floriferous mophead hydrangeas beloved by my dad and his gardening friends, there are some gorgeous lacecaps; try the relatively new "Paniculata “Wim’s Red” variety which changes from a creamy white to dark red over the summer and my absolute favourite variety “Tardiva” dark green leaves and loosely packed panicles of creamy-white flowers. Nothing a hydrangea loves more than a wet summer so we’re in for a treat this year!

Finally, I would 100% recommend Olearia Macradonta, “New Zealand Holly” because one, it’s evergreen, two, It has lovely sage green leaves; three its daisy-like flowers in summer have a delicious musky/coconutty smell; and four it always seems to grow in a pretty shape without much prompting from me! The only drawback is that it’s not terribly hardy so here in London, it really needs to be sited against a south-facing wall that gets plenty of sun.

So, if you want a relatively easy to manage bunch of plants that will flood your garden with a variety of colours and scents, give a couple of these a go!

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