Flowers from the Floral Art Marquee at the Southport Flower Show, on now, running until Sunday 19th August, 2018. Continue reading
Tag: Macro
Mill on The Floss – a new pink English rose for 2018
The recent RHS Hampton Court Flower Show offered the chance to see some new varieties up close. Today I’m sharing a few pictures taken at the show of a new introduction from David Austin, Rosa ‘Mill on the Floss’. Continue reading
Plant anthropomorphism
It may just be my strange way of seeing things but these plants all seem to have an anthropomorphic character. Geranium ‘Elke’ is surely offering a hand for the passer-by to shake? Continue reading
Macro Monday: Iris With Ferns
These plant bedfellows seem to embody contrasts and echoes. Both are linear, with some symmetry, but neither are rigidly so. I get the feeling a mathematician might find reverie here. Curves, curls – wobbles, even – add complexity and soften any harshness. Someone or something has taken a chunk out of one iris petal, but the lines and colours are so hypnotic, we hardly notice it. Continue reading
Spring Flowers, Picked And Growing
Yesterday’s trip to Gresgarth Hall Garden for the March hellebore open day is always pencilled into my calendar. One of my favourite bits is the table of floral goodies prepared for visitors to hang over, all neatly labelled. These crocus flowers were part of this year’s display.
On the far side of the river, the crocuses were flowering in their natural surroundings. Slender, arching leaves, each with its silver stripe, made a lovely contrast with moss and fallen beech tree leaves. Continue reading
Wordless Wednesday: Hellebore macros
Weekly Photo Challenge: Favourite Flower Pics 2017
Erythronium from this post: Woodland Plants – Erythronium dens canis Continue reading
A Rainbow of Flowers
Flowers In Shades Of Pink
Sugar pink: a double flowered camellia
Dusty pink: a clump of echinaceas wearing golden coronets
Rose pink: a glorious tumble of old fashioned ‘Hyde Hall’ roses
Sempervivum ‘Lady Kelly’: A Beautiful, Unusual Form Of Hen And Chicks
Sempervivum ‘Lady Kelly’ with one chick growing out sideways from its mother (front, left).
Many people know sempervivum as houseleek, or hen and chicks, which celebrates the plantlets produced as offsets. It is monocarpic which means the original rosette-like plant will reach flowering size after several years’ growth, then after flowering once, will shrivel and die, being succeeded by its chicks of various ages and any seedlings.
Sempervivum ‘Lady Kelly’ seems to be a rare form. The place where I saw it (Beth Chatto’s nursery) didn’t have any for sale and when I searched for one to buy online, I couldn’t find any source, let alone an equally reputable one.*
The rich lavender – blue – grey colouring was very striking in real life against the greens and corals. I fell immediately in love with the plant and ‘Blue Boy’ a similarly coloured sempervivum cultivar that I might share in a future post. Continue reading
