I find all euphorbias deeply unattractive but not naff. I've never seen a vanilla marigold so googled it and rather like it? Same with creamy California poppies whereas I find the orange and yellow forms a bit too fluorescent for my taste but not naff.
Houseplant orchids are naff cos they're plasticky but the wild ones growing in teh lanes round here are lovely.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
I'm definately not a 'fashionista'. My garden and if i like it i grow it. However i do dislike:
Euphorbia - i just don't like the look. Petunia - look ok for a week or two then look awful. Your hands go sticky when you dead head. Roses - yes. Shocking i know but i simply can't stand them.
Gardening. The cause of, and solution to, all of my problems.
@B3 I think you are the first person I've ever heard say they don't like sweet peas.....summer wouldn't feel like summer to me if I hadn't sweet peas in the garden and @stewyfizz you don't like roses?......really?!
The thing about begonias is they flower more or less in the dark, which is unusual - fuchsias too.
I think there is probably a flower for everywhere and it's possible to make flower look beautiful, so I'd avoid the 'naff' label. I do have a long list of things I wouldn't want in my garden.
Naffest of all (in my view) is garden ornaments. I don't know why the line between tasteful and naff is very fine in the garden. But it is. To me a statue of any person or animal is almost certainly over the line. In fact anything ornamental in the garden is too perilously close.
I have a mirror I dearly love (yes, I know the wildlife dangers) a few rocks I like and that's about it. I have a Buddha in my front garden, guarding the front door and hiding a secret, but she discretely resides inside a rosebush. My friends know she is there. My house has all manner of twinkly things and seed head mobiles hanging, that I couldn't bear in the garden. It's odd.
Solar lights are another peril. I used to quite like them. Now I think they are generally naff and I've taken them all down as I want to encourage fuller darkness and moths and bats.
I don't like gladioli but I think that's Dame Edna's fault. I still can't bear to throw out the ones I inherited when I moved in though. Roses have to earn their keep in my garden by flowering all the time, smelling delicious and being virtually thornless and disease free. Not much to ask is it. I like tall plants to stay upright without being staked and I like my inherited hotlips but not as much as all the other salvias I have.
I picked up a couple of cheap reasonably priced phlox paniculata last year. What could possibly go wrong? This is childrens' nail polish and they are approximately the shade of the bottle on the far right of picture. Flame Coral, I think, in case you want to rush out and buy it.
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Houseplant orchids are naff cos they're plasticky but the wild ones growing in teh lanes round here are lovely.
Euphorbia - i just don't like the look.
Petunia - look ok for a week or two then look awful. Your hands go sticky when you dead head.
Roses - yes. Shocking i know but i simply can't stand them.
Roses have to earn their keep in my garden by flowering all the time, smelling delicious and being virtually thornless and disease free. Not much to ask is it.
I like tall plants to stay upright without being staked and I like my inherited hotlips but not as much as all the other salvias I have.
This is childrens' nail polish and they are approximately the shade of the bottle on the far right of picture.
Flame Coral, I think, in case you want to rush out and buy it.
"Pink to make the boys wink"