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Cottage Gardens are informal, sort of like casual, messy carpet beds. The patronizing word is "charming".
Great Gardens of Great Houses designed before 1930 have different perennial beds and garden styles for each season . They are like "rooms" often separated by walls or hedges. A spring garden. A rock garden. A June garden. A white garden. A rhododendron/azalea woodland garden. A summer garden, full of annuals and lilies. A fall garden with chrysanthemums and asters. And don't forget a water garden with a weeping willow. Dumbarton Oaks in Washington D.C. and Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania are typical and open to the public.
Monet's Garden style is sort of an explosion of flowers in lush beds, in vibrant impressionist colors. Annuals, perennials, roses, vines and naturally the pond with water lilies. It's a small garden but it has 6 gardeners plus greenhouses. They constantly replant and fill in the bare spots. When I was there they were planting 48 yellow flowers in an area about 2 square feet. Also dividing and replanting their entire iris bed. Oh would that I had just one of those French guys to help me.
Fashion being what it is, we still chase that myth of the perfect perennial border. Yet, in a small garden without an army of gardeners, it is a challenge. So what to do?
Make a plan. Carefully. Design it on paper. Then through the season, keep track of what performed well and what didn't, so you can improve the plan the next year. The plan is half the fun. Try to cluster three or so plants of each variety together to make a better show. Repeat the clusters to make the eye move when looking at the garden. Consider different clones of the same plant, daylilies for instance, that bloom sequentially.
Read the catalogues with a jaundiced eye. Look for the words "vigorous" and make sure the plants are hardy in your region. One avid perennial gardener I know lives by the 1/3 rule. Each spring, 1/3 are dead, 1/3 he didn't like and 1/3 remain to bloom again. (He spends a king's ransom on plants each spring.)
Receive gift plants with grace for they are often the most vigorous. Otherwise people wouldn't have so many to give away. Garden Club sales are a great source for best plants for your area. Of course, nothing is without a caveat. Make sure they are not too invasive like the mint family or barren strawberry.
Resign yourself to buying some "must haves" each year. Delphinium for instance. Mine never survive the winter, but oh, they are so glorious. And pure blue. There must be blue in my garden even though it's so hard to find true blues.
Grow some plants that self seed. Annuals like cosmos and cleome for instance or biennials like campanula, digitalis and forget-me-nots.
Why bother? To delight in the colors and enjoy!
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Text by Ruth S. Foster
© 2001 Mother's Garden
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