Garden inspiration comes in many guises. Much of mine comes from neighbouring gardens and green spaces, which comes with a range of added benefits. It doesn’t cost anything to peer into front gardens or peruse wild or ornamental plants in a park. It’s a great firsthand way to observe plants through the seasons and their own personal lifecycles including the size they might grow to when mature. It’s also a brilliant way to pick up tips on what grows best in your soil or aspect as these are factors that neighbouring plots often share.
This week my eye has been drawn to vines, climbers and ramblers a lot, partly because many of these wandering plants are just budding with foliage or early spring flower, but also because I’ve made a mind file labelled ‘onwards and upwards’ that relates to specific areas in our garden. An upwardly mobile plant: to ramble over the bike shed at the front; adorn the front of our house; vegetate the trellis that we need to install along east and west walls out back; for the remaining section of back fence on view; and for the new fence dividing our house and that of our neighbour Laura. The latter space is particularly bare and needs sprucing up for both parties.
The urgency with which a climber is apt to grow up a wall or fence is mirrored in my mind. I really want to get these beauties in because they have the potential to create much needed privacy, greenery , scent and seasonal interest but at a relatively fast pace. From vines and climbers already present in my garden – the stalwart and soon to be flowering Jasminus officinale, several types of ivy and a Clematis montana in particular, I can visibly see the race to fruition already picking up pace.
So what kind of vines, climbers and ramblers are on my mind? The first thing that comes to mind is a succession of clematis. The ‘Queen of Climbers’ produces masses of blooms in a range of shapes and sizes. There are clematis for all seasons, perfect candidates for walls and fences; the ideal match for a pergola, a tree, the front of a house or a border; a clematis for sun and for shade. And the choice is extensive stemming from 300 plus species in the genus Clematis (part of the buttercup family Ranuncuaceae) in addition to numerous hybrids and cultivars.
We already have a Clematis montana, which has a vigorous nature, but it has taken a hit over the past few years with all the fence and border changes. I think it may need replacing so currently looking at the highly scented white Clematis montana var. wilsonii, the pink Clematis montana var. rubens ‘Tetrarose’ or the pale pink Clematis montana var. rubens ‘Elizabeth’. Good for my north facing back fence, flowering in May. I also bought a Clematis armandii last year but didn’t get round to planting it yet as we hadn’t and still haven’t quite finished the hard landscaping at the front (where I want to plant it to scale the bike shed is currently a pre-tip dumping ground for all the house renovation refuse). I’m dying to get this in as it is in flower now and from what I can see of the glorious bloom of one such C. armandi at the bottom of Balmoral Bridge – a plant I pass probably four times a day at least – it really puts on a show. This beauty is an early spring flowerer – March to April – and has long dark green, shiny lance-shaped leaves and creamy white star-shaped heavily perfumed blooms. There’s also a pink-tinted one called ‘Apple Blossom’. The birds must love roosting and even nesting in this plant.
I may interplant this clematis with other seasonal charmers such as delicately blue flowering Clematis Alpina, which flowers from April to May (fine in sun or partial shade); one from the Clematis viticella group, which times nicely after wild roses have stopped blooming in June (I also have a couple of rambling Rosa alba and Rosa canina to plant); and a bell-shaped winter flowering Clematis urophylla ‘Winter Beauty’ or a Clematis cirrhosa ‘Freckles’ or ‘Wisley Cream’, which can flower from December through to March/April. I can’t quite get my head around the large-flowered summer clematis yet, many of which come with royal associations e.g. Prince Charles, Princess Diana or Princess Kate, mainly because I see these are ornamental highlights rather than wilder, rambling affairs. One for a future pergola perhaps if that ever materialises anywhere.
Going back to the Clematis armandii on Balmoral Road – this has been interwoven with a passionflower and I love this combination. Not least because I have always wanted a passionflower and despite multiple hints (Mother’s Day perhaps??), I’ve never laid my hands on one. Again there are numerous species and cultivars but my mind is thinking of the Passiflora caerulea, the classic ‘blue passionflower’, with its twining tendrils, dark green leaves, green-white petals and blue-purple coronal filaments. I pass several passionflowers on my school run and they all also produce orange ovoid fruits. In all, passionflowers are just breathtakingly beautiful in every way.
Finally, I’m thinking roses of which I already have a few ready to go: a Rosa canina that’s currently dwindling in the wrong place. It wants shelter but also full sun, and I want it for it’s pretty pink open flowers but also the rose hips at the end of summer, with which to make various vitamin C-rich herbal concoctions. I also have three Rosa albas, also in the wrong place, which produce beautiful white open flowers and large red hips. The only problem is that they lose their leaves, which go yellow in autumn, and are very spiky. Perhaps these are also candidates for the back fence, where a pink rose of unknown name and type has begun to look a bit worse for ware.
Next, I snuck myself a bareroot Rosa ‘Rambling Rector’ into a David Austin order when buying one as a present, which promises masses of creamy, double petalled flowers with yellow stamens, followed by similarly numerous hips in autumn. It has a musky scent and may well be the perfect candidate for the new currently bare fence between us and Laura, bringing beauty and fragrance to both sides of the fence. It’s a tall rambler, growing up to 7.5 metres so should do the job (this fence is about 6 foot tall) and is ideal for shady areas. Just need to check how fast it grows. We also both want a plant that will give shelter, food and retreat to birds, many of which used to visit the previous hedge of Pyracantha that we finally had to cut down due to its straggly nature. I think the Rector should house and feed the birds beautifully.
Last but not least I bought two ‘Generous Gardener’ roses last year and planted one (to grow up my new home studio – note to self, must put in wires or some kind of obelisk for that) but didn’t manage to plant the second one. I did originally plan to grow it up the front of our house as I wanted to inhale the sugar sherbet scent as I walked through the door but we now need to paint the front of our house first so I might have to find another home for it – at least for now. Up Tom’s shed perhaps!
Ah, suddenly feels like there’s a lot to do and it’s all getting potentially expensive, but hopefully there’s also going to be lots of gardening days to come. Love feeling raring to go but must also remember it’s not a race and I can slow down and let nature take its course.