Wintery white garden

White polyantha rose

When I first heard about a white garden idea, it sounded cool and interesting and something that I would love to accomplish in own garden. Then I started thinking about it more practically and... I figured it has certain risks to turn out not how I would have expected it to be.

For starters, how do I avoid dullness, when copy pasting the same color all over again? It has to come with some other points of interest, like interesting foliage, different shapes of plants and possibly fragrances to increase the effect. In a nut shell, it means I would have to go for a variety of plants, but that also brings me to the next problem, seasons and growing preferences. White tulips like sun and bloom in spring, white astilbe blooms towards the autumn and likes shade, so that sort of combo probably won't work at all. In other words, if I screw up the planning, I can easily end up with a rather boring and mostly green garden, which occasionally features some white blooms. So, there we go, spring, summer or autumn white garden, shade or full sun? And I am not even going into a soil preferences yet. :)

And then there also is a thing with enjoying white garden in the night. In theory it could be impressive, with whites being most visible in the dark, but... for one I am sure mosquitoes would have a say in it as well, and then it also means this part of the garden should be reasonably close by, so I don't have to stumble all over the tomatoes or cabbages to go and have a glass of wine.

White pansies (violas)

Soo, all in all, I did not make a white garden, but I have quite a few white plants. For me it is more enjoyable to create a small white corner there and there, without committing to a big white plan. While spring usually means bulbs, I also find violas (pansies) to be extremely useful in adding some color (or white... which is also a color, sorta) to the garden in early spring. Over here in NL they become commonly available somewhere in February, and while they are at their best in spring, with a bit of (bad)luck and cold spring they last well into the summer. Some cultivars (especially the small bloom ones), also have a pleasant fragrance, so it is worth to follow your nose when selecting which ones of the bunch to bring home. For some more permanent solution there also are wild perennial species, such as Viola sororia 'Albiflora' for example, something I would love to add to the garden in the years to come.

White muscari

Then there are bulbs of course. For convenience in planning I usually sort them into "small early" and "tulips, narcissus and co", which bloom later in a season. First come snowdrops (even a few subspecies of them for more interest), later followed by white crocus and white muscari. There also are some rarer plants that I love, such as chionodoxa gigantea alba, which always makes me imagine that J.R.R. Tolkien's simbelmynë should look like that; or leucojum, looking like a giant snowdrop on steroids. We used to have the latter in an old garden, shamelessly nicked from an abandoned allotment, where it was growing happily in an unkempt garden turned a wild meadow.

All of these small jewels can form a lovely white corner in the garden: I remember passing an old orchard with whole ground under the trees covered by snowdrop carpet! Bulbs generally do well under the trees, as their vegetation is mostly over by the time the trees leaf out, so they are not affected by the shade or are adapted to it. Trees also tend to keep soil dryer, which is another bulby preference.

Tulip "Exotic Emperror"

Speaking of narcissus and tulips, there of course are numerous, numerous cultivars to choose from, single, full, frosted, rippled and what not else. I have grown a few, and from those few my absolute favorite was/is tulip Exotic Emperor. She has those beautiful unruly petals, which swirl in the odd angles like some silky robes. It is one of those plants that are really exciting to take photos of, because every bloom is slightly different. It is definitely not a dull white blob, like some other white flowers can feel at times.

Magnolia stellata

It also reminds me of another favorite plant, magnolia stellata, which has a similar shape of a blossom. I have a  love and disappointment affair with magnolias in general, the first one I got looong time ago in my LT garden, after reading some article in a gardening magazine, about a woman who was growing them in z5. I bought one from her, unfortunately after 10 or so years in the garden, it still has to produce a single bloom (although my mother said it finally started growing)!

I was swearing I will grow one here in NL, where hardiness is not an issue... and I never bought one. Thing is, while they are very spectacular in bloom, especially Magnolia × soulangeana, they are fairly dull as a tree for the rest of the year, and their blossoming is quite short lived. Besides, blooms can get ruined by the frost bite, making it quite unattractive that year, and apparently they litter the garden with their pods quite a bit (my sister-in-law's patio under one was a constant mess). Since I am not particularly fond of things dropping into my coffee, somewhere down the line I decided it is best enjoyed in the neighboring gardens, where you still get a show and don't have to deal with the mess.

Now, saying I did not buy one, does not cover a tiny magnolia stellata that was already growing in this garden, and it was one of the few plants I kept. Here in NL it grows to be a large shrub or a small tree, depending on how it was pruned,  and even though it is fairly dull for the rest of the year, it is glorious when it blooms. Mine is really small, as it took me years to figure that they need a full sun to thrive, but even this tiny plant managed to produce a few lovely blooms in some springs. Now when the sun preferences are sorted, I hope to see much more of it in the years to come. :)

Rose Aspirin

But lets leave the spring and move to the summer, when perennials and roses steal the show. I have a bit too big collection of roses to talk about all of them whites in one post, especially since they range from mini plants barely 50 cm high, to huge climbers reaching to 5 meters and higher. There is the old favorite Iceberg, probably one of the most well known roses in commerce. There is Mrs. Herbert Stevens and Sombreuil (formerly known as Colonial White), both big and fragrant climbers, and Paul's Lemon Pillar (almost white, with huge blooms) with Long John Silver (big rambler), and Madame Hardy with other old garden roses. And then there are numerous modern incarnations of white: shrubs, hybrid teas, floribundas, "English roses", minis and so on, of which I own only Tineke, so far a rather disappointing hybrid tea. White is a bit tricky color for the modern roses, because a lot of them are rather average plants vigor wise, and also they seem to be rather susceptible to rain damage(making the petals look spotted and meh). They easily can look dirty as well, if their blooms get spattered with the soil during a heavy shower.

Snow in summer (Cerastium tomentosum)

Speaking of other flowers in the garden, there are of course many white cultivars of most of the garden favorites: peonies, phloxes, malvas, irises, lilies and all sorts of other perennials and annuals. One of my favorite whites is snow-in-summer (Cerastium tomentosum), a useful creeping border plant, with silvery leaves and pretty white flowers in the beginning of the summer. It is very hardy, can't recall it ever being damaged in our cold LT winters, does not require much care, apart of puling it out from where it should not spread and dealing with the balding patches if it grew in the same place for a very long time. Weeds did not seem to like growing through it, so that's another big plus.

Sweet alyssum (Lobularia maritima)

Another edging plant I often add to the garden is sweet alyssum, the common annual. Sweet alyssum is somewhat a misleading name, because this annual actually does not belong to genus alyssum (although it was classified as such in the past), its correct name is Lobularia maritima. Originally coastal plant, from somewhere in Mediterranean, it can turn into a weed if growing conditions mimic its natural habitat, but it also can self seed and survive in much colder climates, particularly preferring to germinate in/on sand (which is great in the front of a mixed border, and less great between the tiles). Of course, since it is an annual plant, there is some hassle with it to create a nice trim around the edge of the border, you have to sow it and then care for it till it reaches a blooming size, but normally it germinates fairly well, "grows up" around midsummer and continues blooming well into autumn. If the autumn is very mild and winter late, as it often is the case here, it can last fairly long or even overwinter; it was still green in a pot I had it planted when I checked it in the end of January.

Silene

To think of it, other two of my favorite small border plants are also white: Iberis sempervirens and different varieties of white silene (such as silene vulgaris, silene latifolia, etc.). Iberis is another Mediterranean native, over here in NL it can be grown as a low groundcover sub-shrub, something in between a perennial and a shrub, similar to ericas. It is reasonably shade and drought tolerant, however it does not like water logged soils. Grows slow, difficult to divide, but lovely when blooming in spring, and rather attractive foliage plant for the rest of the season. Silene latifolia is native to most of Europe and part of Asia, and in some countries it is known as a grave flower, because in the wild it often grows in abandoned sites or graveyards; and that was how I encountered it first, when I was still a kid - growing on an abandoned grave next to the resting place of my great-grandfather (although I believe there it was planted intentionally). Silene vulgaris is considered an edible plant in Mediterranean, apparently used in soup, salads and other dishes of the local cuisine(especially popular in Crete it seems).

Hydrangea arborescens

Speaking of summer garden, I do like an idea of a wintery white garden in shade, especially because often it is the most problematic corner of the garden, and at the same time, it is the most nice corner to sit in a hot summer day. If I had to do it again, I probably would combine white rhododendrons, different kinds of hydrangea, mixed with astilbes and a few other perennials for some extra interest. There are many white hydrangeas available, starting with the climbing ones (Schizophragma hydrangeoides, Hydrangea petiolaris), which do really well on a North wall and have quite minimal demands for the light in general. I have seen many old established climbers here in the village ( and that usually indicates that it is a reliable, easy to grow plant). Another common white hydrangea is a wool-head Hydrangea arborescens, very hardy and forming quite a prominent shrub when established. Old flowers can also be very easily dried and used in winter flower arrangements. Spiky flower heads of Hydrangea paniculata are also useful for drying, and it grows a bit more tidy and upright, rather than forming a thicket like arborescens. Hydrangea quercifolia has a very lovely oak-leaf-like foliage, which turns very nice color in the autumn. Looking for something a bit smaller, there also are many white hybrids of Hydrangea macrophylla, including those very pretty double ones.

Astilbe "King Arthur"

Astilbe is another useful plant for more shady corners. I kept planting them in full sun and wondered why they sulk, before I saw them placed in a shade plants' corner in a garden center - that was a really useful enlightenment! They come in a wide range of red-pink-white color shades, and different heights, from 50cm to 1m 50cm. There also is a similar looking plant Aruncus, which grows to be much much bigger; an old one at our neighbors was about 2 m tall and 2 m wide.

There are of course numerous other perennials and bulbs, which can be added to a white shade garden, Lysimachia clethroides (white tails, gooseneck), or white vinca, or lamium album (white dead-nettle) for a ground cover, as well as white Japanese anemones, which also like some dappled shade. That, and a white clematis, different subspecies of which can provide a blooming season from March till late September.

And then, to finish the season, there are white colchicums and white asters, which combined with a white berry bushes (such as Symphoricarpos albus) keep up the prettiness in the garden until a gardening season wheel turns again.