Garden designers do, and sometimes they win gold medals at shows like Chelsea - and very fine they are, too. But more ordinary people like me, who just love their gardens and their plants and who live with them, well, it's a bit of a dog's dinner in my garden and I love it!
My garden looks like an explosion in a paint factory, I don't care what clashes with what, I put shocking pinks with bright orange.
It does tend to be very soft, late spring and summer, pinks blues and lilacs, but late summer it's a riot of hot colours. I can't have too many plants, as long as you can put a group of one variety together, one plant on its own doesn't go so well, unless you have a tiny garden.
Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor.
Watching one of 'Big Dreams Small Spaces' I think there was mention of having 7-10 different plants in a garden.
Isn't that the difference between "Garden Designers" and us mere mortals? They need to keep coming up with new ideas to justify their existence whereas we simply enjoy our gardens and gardening.
There is one regular contributor to various gardening programmes who looks down his nose and sneers at those who love the more traditional gardens. For him hanging baskets and colourful borders are just proof of how backward and unsophisticated the plebs are. To me his attitude is more like the kings new clothes!
For me there is only one rule in gardening - Grow what you want to.
Love your analogy Lyn - I'm seriously thinking about an orange and acid yellow / lime green border with maybe a splash of purple so that isn't going to fit in at all - but I don't care either
At some point I'll probably be asking for bright orange / acid yellow plant suggestions!
It would very much depend on the size of your garden I would think.
I have around 10 different types becasue my garden isn't massive but I'd have loads more in a bigger garden.
My main mistake was dotting the same type of plant on it's own all over the garden which looked bitty but now I plant them in groups or swathes but Gertrude Jekyll told me that - I've been reading her book and the garden looks far better now.
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Garden designers do, and sometimes they win gold medals at shows like Chelsea - and very fine they are, too. But more ordinary people like me, who just love their gardens and their plants and who live with them, well, it's a bit of a dog's dinner in my garden and I love it!
I do different things, with different areas of the garden.
I do have a bed where I think I only have 6 or 7 species, and I use them in drifts. I think that it looks good.
In another bed, I use blocks of plants, and other areas are different again.
I think everyone should do what makes their garden look good, to them.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
It does tend to be very soft, late spring and summer, pinks blues and lilacs, but late summer it's a riot of hot colours. I can't have too many plants, as long as you can put a group of one variety together, one plant on its own doesn't go so well, unless you have a tiny garden.
Yes I agree. A border with 10 single different plants, might look "spotty", whereas grouping 3 or more of the same species, may look better.
But at the end of the day, it is all personal choice / opinion.
"Opinions are like a#######s everyone's got one", as Clint Eastwood once said.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
Isn't that the difference between "Garden Designers" and us mere mortals? They need to keep coming up with new ideas to justify their existence whereas we simply enjoy our gardens and gardening.
There is one regular contributor to various gardening programmes who looks down his nose and sneers at those who love the more traditional gardens. For him hanging baskets and colourful borders are just proof of how backward and unsophisticated the plebs are. To me his attitude is more like the kings new clothes!
For me there is only one rule in gardening - Grow what you want to.
At some point I'll probably be asking for bright orange / acid yellow plant suggestions!
It would very much depend on the size of your garden I would think.
I have around 10 different types becasue my garden isn't massive but I'd have loads more in a bigger garden.
My main mistake was dotting the same type of plant on it's own all over the garden which looked bitty but now I plant them in groups or swathes but Gertrude Jekyll told me that - I've been reading her book and the garden looks far better now.
But that's where the skill comes in Verdun.
!!!
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border