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| The Kitchen Flower Bed
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| This part of the garden, comprising a bed and a 1.8m wide path/patio, gets full sun all day during summer, so I fill it with flowers, pots and troughs and anything else that will give me colour. | |
| This is the real 'cottage-garden' bed, as there are only a few perennials, the rest being given over to annuals and biannuals, in no set pattern, creating the jumble of foliage and flowers that are so reminiscent of cottage gardens. The soil has been improved, by the addition of compost and grit sand, and the front of the bed, being 150mm higher than the paving, is held in check by a small clay kerb manufactured from the same material. A decorative concrete edging, resembling the tops of a dry stone wall, separates the lawn from this bed. I'm not usually too keen on these imitation paving materials, but this one blends in nicely with the cottagey feel. |  Kitchen Bed in High Summer |
 The paving, kitchen bed and garden gate |
The 750mm high Chaemycyparis pairs up with the Thuja of the Patio bed to stand as guards to the pathway, and this specimen is trimmed to a cone shape, with the lower branches a good 200mm off the ground, allowing light in to help the Aubrietia planted beneath. At the other end of this bed, there are two roses, one that belonged to my Grandad, when he was alive and gardening, and a climber, Paul's Scarlet, which is trained up the trellis and across the path to form an archway. There is a Pyracantha between the two roses, which is also trained against the trellis. |
| The paving, being 1.8m wide, is usually covered with pots and troughs, moved about to suit the changing seasons, and the area directly beneath the kitchen window is where the timber cold frame is positioned during Winter and Spring, giving an early start to those plants that need it, before being taken up stored in the compound over Summer and Autumn. Just outside the gate is another large pot with a Rambling rose, New Dawn, being trained up the brickwork to meet up with the Scarlet climber on the overhead trellis-work. There are also window boxes beneath the kitchen window, and hanging baskets in summer and winter. | |
| About half the bed is also planted with Spring bulbs, notably the gorgeous daffodil, Jetfire, at the feet of the roses, and white, purple and blue Anemone blanda over approximately two-thirds of the remainder. The Chaemycyparis is under-planted with Snowdrops and Iris Reticulata. By the time these have finished their season, the annuals, mostly self-sown, start to take over and the rest of the bed starts to come alive. It can look bare in winter, but as with the patio bed, placing pots of winter colour and foliage onto the bed stops it from looking like a bare patch of earth. |  Spring colour in the kitchen bed Daffodils, Anemones and Pulmonaria |
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This is a scale diagram of the layout of the Kitchen Flower Bed. Passing your mouse over each plant will result in the name of the plant being displayed on your status bar. Clicking on any of these hotspots will take you to the page dedicated to that plant. |
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| Planting Schedule for Kitchen Bed | |
Perennials
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Bedding see bedding page
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Bulbs
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Boxes and Baskets see baskets page
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Text, images, design and construction © cormaic web design - Last updated November 1st 2000