The Dorothy Clive Garden in Party Girl Season

Cee’s recent photo challenge  asks us to share two selections of pictures to demonstrate warm and cool colours. My visit to the Dorothy Clive Gardens last May immediately came to mind. At that time of year the gardens were brimming with jewel-like colours: the azaleas and rhododendrons were at their peak and the companion planting sensational.

Continue reading “The Dorothy Clive Garden in Party Girl Season”

Recreating Rappaccini’s Garden: an Eden of Poisonous Flowers

Floral tapestry

Spotted foxglove

I’ve been looking for pictures of plants to bring to life the garden created by Rappaccini, the twisted plant breeder of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s fable, and ‘as true a man of science as ever distilled his own heart in an alembic’. Rappaccini, like Frankenstein, used science to create a monster: his beguiling, innocent, but deadly daughter Beatrice. He and his daughter tend a collection of poisonous plants with heady, intoxicating fragrances that can wither and kill.   Continue reading “Recreating Rappaccini’s Garden: an Eden of Poisonous Flowers”

White Cottage Garden Plants for a Moon Garden

White alstromeria
White alstromeria with prominent bee lines

I prefer to use white flowers as an accent colour, but I know that many people love all white gardens (sometimes called moon gardens because of the way the flowers reflect the light). Here are some of my favourites – I hope you like some of them too. If I’ve mentioned where I photographed them, the gardens are well worth a visit.  Continue reading “White Cottage Garden Plants for a Moon Garden”