Every garden has a shady corner where the flowers and shrubs just don’t seem to dance. You long to spiff it up with something bright and beautiful but the task seems overwhelming. Isn’t there anything you can do? What if you could get a magic box containing everything you need to bring color, texture and beauty to that part of the backyard the sun doesn’t kiss? Bluestone Perennials has just that – an entire garden in a box, and they call it Shade Garden.
This box contains everything you need to fill a huge garden bed with flowers and foliage from spring to fall. Yes, there are plants, some 24 of them all told, 19 different varieties. Some offer bright blossoms, others are boldly colored or have delicately textured leaves. Some are tall, some are short, and all are happy in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 4 through 8. Every plant comes in a pot 3.5 inches (9 cm.) square and 4 inches (10 cm.) deep. Here are a few stand-outs.
Remember Me
Say hi to the hostas, foliage queens of the shade garden. The selection includes Great Expectations, with its incredible yellow leaves and sea-green markings, and Blue Angel with blue-green textured leaves the size of elephant ears. Then there is Remember Me, a hosta with canary yellow leaves edged in smoky green that, presto-chango, fade to angelic white in mid-summer.
Ostrich Plume
The flowers are also showstoppers, like astilbe Ostrich Plume, with brilliant pink weeping panicles and airy plumes that sway in a summer breeze. The color is echoed and intensified in the Morton foxglove, its upright flower stalks a full 3 feet (.9 m.) tall and laden with stunning bell-shaped blossoms. The flower selection is incredible, but that’s not the only cool thing about the Shade Garden. The design for the garden is included too.
You may have shopped the section of the garden store offering shade perennials, turning from one to the next indecisively. Imagining how one plant compliments its neighbors takes practice, and it’s equally hard to envision the look as one plant fades and another takes its place. Leave that chapter behind you. With Bluestone Perennials Shade Garden, experts have pulled together the layout of the perennial bed for you, figuring out which plants will look best beside each other.
Do you envision a rectangular garden bed for the shady corner? Bluestone Perennials has you covered with a Shade Garden design for a rectangular bed 14 feet (4 m.) long and 6 feet (1.8 m.) wide, including a map of the finished plot and detailed instructions for planting. Or maybe you dream of an oval shade bed? An alternate plan is included for the ideal organization of an island layout. Both options provide a suggested arrangement of the great plant combination, providing easy success and color all season – just the thing for those drab, dark areas of the landscape.
