Or alternatively, “A Study in White”.
I’m a sucker for border design plans, so when our “Cottage Border” started looking tired and in need of a revamp, a plan I saw in a garden magazine for a cottage border really excited me. The lynch pins of the plan were pink roses (the plan used “Comte de Chambord” which I substituted with “Gertrude Jekyll” already in the border) and three plants of the hydrangea “Annabelle”. It was a plan incorporating lots of blowsy pinks and whites, dark blue spires, with highlights of black, courtesy of iris “Deep Black” and viola “Moly Sanderson”. So striking, but also very pretty and cottagey.
A few years on and some of the plants have struggled (I’ve learned that Campanula “Sarastro” is yet another slug delicacy! One flush, never to be seen again!) while others have well and truly flourished. No prizes for guessing which!
I have been trying to adapt these shortfalls to accommodate more of my scented shrubs, so is still a work in progress. But can you believe these hydrangeas?
“Annabelle” is stunning – quite a spectacle, you must agree!
This is just one of the shrubs!
And look at the size of these blooms! Much larger than the palm of my hand!
Her beauty is not restricted to the border. She performs just as well indoors, cut for vases in the house.
There’s more than enough blooms to give us a pair of vases.
Notice my “new” rose bowl’s second outing!
But, as with all unruly children, a bit of control will be needed.
Too many other plants risk being swamped and lost to her excessive advances. She needs reigning in! So I must invest in some more of those semi-circular supports that I have found so successful in other areas of the garden.
She’s a definite Diva!
The Long Garden Path 