Leaves and garden design

An intriguing new (for me) idea in garden design has been changing the way I look at my garden, and seems to be making a long-term change in the way I will choose my plants in the future. I learned a long time ago to think about the different heights of my plants, and their bloom times and colour. Then I got a little more sophisticated and I started thinking about playing up the contrasts in the size and shape of plants and the size and shapes and colours of their leaves. Ferns and hostas are a natural combination in this department with the broad, bold leaves of the hostas contrasting so nicely with the tiny, lacy leaves of most ferns.

But though I had paid lip service to the idea of varying leaf sizes, I realized after reading a posting in a forum some time back that I spent much more time looking at leaf shape and colour than I did at size and that my garden was indeed chock full of plants with small leaves - long, slender ones, finely dissected ones, tear-shaped ones, but - with the exception of a couple of hostas - all small ones.

For those of us who live in more northerly areas, this is an easy situation to fall into. There just aren't many large-leafed plants that grow naturally or easily around here. Gunneras, bananas and taros just don't figure in the natural flora. And that's a pity. Because the more I mull it over and the more I stare at my gardens, the more I realize that all those small leaves contribute to an overly busy, cluttered effect. What I really need is a lot more large-leafed plants to provide a break from all the fine details and give my garden a better balance.

In honour of this new-found wisdom, I went out and bought a couple of bergenias to replace some ground covers and chose a trio of coleus with huge leaves to fill in the gaps in my front bed. I will also be eyeing some of my under-performing plants and contemplating replacing them with some of the bigger hostas. Those cannas may move out of the pots and into the beds (yes, I know, this isn't novel but I'd never thought about it before as a leaf issue) and who knows, maybe a rhubarb patch in the ornamental border might be an idea worth playing with.

On the other hand, that datura may have nice big leaves, but I do think it's time to make a little less room for it nonetheless. Where did my secateurs go?



Technorati tag: Garden design