Flowers, herbs, veggies…who says you can’t mix it up and make beautiful combinations with them?
winter mix…
Dyron’s Restaurant, next door in the old market space, opted to keep the three horse troughs in front…they added a couple of charming painted wooden benches in between two of them and asked if we would continue planting and maintaining them.
fall/winter planting – lettuce, kale, chard, herbs
The planters are large and perfect for a good mix of herbs and flowers…and they get a lot of afternoon sun. This past winter the photos above show the planting included kale and chard with green and red lettuce, curly parsley, dill, variegated lemon thyme, silver thyme and trailing rosemary. Pansies and violas were added for even more color – and they’re edible too! During the holidays I added red twig dogwood branches in the center of each trough for additional interest.
for summer – lots of herbs and some flowers too…
This spring I gradually pulled out plants as they played out – the kale was the first to go after it went to flower. (They’re actually quite pretty when they bloom or bolt – with pretty yellow flowers on tall stalks.) Next the chard, curly parsley and violas were pulled out, fresh potting soil added, some of the remaining thyme and rosemary trimmed and they were ready to be planted for the summer…
Bright colors look good in front of the newly painted dark brown of the new porch space, so for the flowers I opted for yellow and white Profusion and narrow leaf zinnias and red Dragonwing begonias. A little Osmocote was added under the flowers to feed them through long the summer.
- Horse troughs planted with a mix of herbs and flowers for Dyron’s Restaurant next door
Next, herbs…for the center trough I put in a lemon grass – this will get quite large and should provide the chef with plenty of goodness! Next, sweet and purple basil – hopefully they’ll be cutting plenty of basil for summer dishes – the variagated lemon thyme and trailing rosemary were left in place – they’re doing quite well and seem happy.
The sage you see is ‘Berggarten’, a beautiful large leaf sage, and it’s complimented by ‘Downy’ lavender, grown primarily for the blue flowers that continue through the summer if they’re kept deadheaded.
Maintenance on these planters will involve pinching the zinnias back, keeping the basil and other herbs clipped, and hoping the Dragonwing begonias don’t get too enormous – but, if they do, a little judicious clipping should keep them in check. The zinnias will add a lot of color and should fill in nicely…
Watering daily will be a necessity as the summer wears on.
We’ll keep you updated as these horse trough potager plantings fill in this season! If you’re interested in container gardening and want more tips, take a look also at this post from earlier this spring – it also shows some combinations with herbs and flowers…
– Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
These cork bark pieces are so organic and natural…we love them and wanted to pass on just a couple of ideas for planting them. Actually, they were one of those happy accidents – one wrong stroke of the keyboard, with a different item number ordered than planned, and, voila, these cork bark pieces arrived the other day that were rounded, with just enough space for planting rather than being flat…oh, happy day!
Of course, if you’ve been keeping up with previous posts, you know we’ve gotten in some pretty cool looking succulents, as well as air plants and the beginning of the new season’s herb offerings. So, with all this bounty to work with, one bark planter became a succulent, herb, airplant design and the other became a study in silvery grays and blues with a pop of chartreuse…
As with any combination planting, look at color, texture and form of the plants you’re working with. The bark is rough and brown…in one planting the red coloring of the hens and chicks play off the brown of the planter while the red edging of the thyme also picks up the color of the succulents. The spiky air plants contrast with the rounded forms of the rolled bark as well.
And there are such pretty things to play with! This time of year, with spring in the air but not quite yet here – this is the time of hydrangeas, calla lilies and sweet alyssum – the soft colors of Easter mingling and overlapping with the brightness of other, more exuberant blooms of gerbera daisies, ranunculus and the first of the geraniums. So much to work with! So we begin to gather flowers and foliage and perhaps a few herbs to add their scent, color and texture to the mix.
This post isn’t going to be about design rules, because quite frankly, we sometimes break them. (Maybe we’re just rebels at heart!) No, this is about what feels and looks right to you. And, perhaps it’s more about not being afraid of making a “mistake” – with arrangements, container plantings or your own garden.
