With the arrival of spring, the garden comes to life with a rainbow of colours. Here we offer a celebration of the garden at this time of the year.
Spring is the season of regeneration. Colours in the garden seem almost raw against the almost leafless background of deciduous trees bursting into leaf. Planning a spring garden needs an understanding of colour.
Contrasting colours in spring provide an eye-catching focal point in the garden. Probably one of the most popular contrasting spring colour schemes in the garden is to plant orange Californian poppies and lilac lavender against a border of white Iceberg roses.
Harmonising colour in the garden can also be a successful way to paint a canvas of colour into your garden during spring. Consider these ideas for the most spectacular of harmonious spring gardens.
In the pink
Pink is at the turning point in the colour spectrum where cool merges with the warm colours. Pink flowers with a tinge of crimson match beautifully with the blues, whereas if your pink flowers have a touch of vermilion, they include a yellow content that matches them with sunset shades.
Ravishing red
Red is the showstopper in any garden. Cool reds provide the garnets and rubies, and their flowers (roses, peonies and cistus) will shine. Hot reds, the scarlets and vermilions have a yellow content and are best cooled down with grey foliage. Red flowers act as superb focal points and will always draw in the eye.
Singing the blues
Blue is the opposite of white. It is a recessive colour that is the last to assert itself at dawn and the first to fade at dusk. Landscape designers use this fact when designing small gardens. By planting up a blue perimeter border in a small garden you can give the optical illusion of space and distance.
Sunset shades
Like a Persian carpet, the sunset shades of burnt orange, copper and gold are warm and sleepy, whilst the crispness of spring yellow is pure and fresh and immediately draws the eye with connotations of joy and fun. The contrast is intoxicating. A sunset garden is at its best when planted against lime-green foliage.
