Buddleja Sungold
This Buddleja brings instant happiness to any garden. In summer and autumn, watch as these yellow blooms erupt from the plant and fill your outdoor space with colour. Fragrant and often buzzing with bees, what could be better!
Grow in a sunny and well drained area and water regularly. Cut back to the base in March for even better results! It won’t hurt it, honest…!
Geranium Johnson’s Blue
Producing plenty of blue-purple flowers, this Geranium is super attractive and works well as a quick cover plant for almost any part of your garden.
A plant that can withstand harsher conditions, its hard to believe it will reward you with such a cloud of blue beauty!
Allium sphaerocephalon
An amazing flower, I often call this the Traffic Light Allium, and it’s a great beginner plant. A floaty effect for mixing into borders and containers, and easy to grow from a bulb!
Plant them in fertile, well-drained soil in a location in your garden with full sun.
Nandina Firepower
Green with fiery red pops, this evergreen can produce small white flowers, but its showstopper is those colour changing leaves!
Also known as Sacred Bamboo, plants are super hardy and would suit full sun or dappled shade.
Osteospermum Erato Double
The beautiful Osteospremum Erato Double looks wonderful in borders and containers, flowering from May to September, without a pause!
These are African daisies, so they dislike cold and wet positions. Plant them in well drained soil in full sun to get the best out of them! I’m sure you’ve got plenty of dry sunny banks where you could find a home for them!
Sempervivum Coral Red
If you thought you could only grow succulents indoors on your windowsill, think again! This is a winter-hardy succulent – yes, really!
Plant them in well drained soil in a position which gets lots of sunlight. After they’re established, they really don’t need much maintenance. They’ll even surprise you with a flower once a year!
Anthemis E C Buxton
Producing beautifully happy flowers in summer, these are a fabulous addition to your garden, and not grown as widely as I think they should be!
They’re best suited to full sun and a well-drained soil, and can also withstand being exposed to windy conditions. Cut back after flowering to encourage another flush of blooms.
Hydrangea Vanilla Fraise
A flower worthy of a dessert platter, this Hydrangea emerges as white before transforming to pink over a long season.
If you’ve got a north-facing garden, this is ideal for you. This plant can withstand temperatures down to -20C degrees! Throw some compost on the soil to make it extra fertile, your Hydrangea will love it.
Pothos – Heart Vine
This stunning heart-leafed houseplant adds a touch of delicate greenery to your home. Pothos is such a popular plant because it suits a variety of conditions, including darker rooms (you’ll know when it has too much light, because the leaves will turn yellow).
Pothos works best when its soil is moist, but not over watered, so go easy with the watering can!
Cercis canadensis Forest Pansy
This fairly compact, deciduous shrub is a colourful treat for the eye. Throughout the year its deep purple leaves bring a kind of vampiness to a garden, but in autumn its hue varies from orange to red.
It doesn’t matter which direction your garden faces, or whether it’s exposed or sheltered, when planting this gem. What it does need, however, is fertile soil which drains well. Provide this and you’re good to go!
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Michael has been involved with gardening and plants since he was just five years old. He is a self-professed Plant Geek, and was listed in the Sunday Times top 20 most influential people in the gardening world, thanks to his plant hunter role at Thompson & Morgan.
Michael was responsible for new plant introductions such as the Egg and Chips plant and the FuchsiaBerry and keeps busy travelling the world in search of new plants as well as lecturing worldwide, including stints in Japan. He is very active on social media – so why not give him a follow at @mr_plantgeek or Facebook. You can also listen to The Plant Based Podcast with Michael and co-host Ellen-Mary on iTunes, Spotify and Google.
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