Mid June

My world is white at the minute: shrubs, roses, plants, greenhouse treasures: all white.
This rose is R. Adelaide ' Orleans, a.k.a. Leopoldine d'Orleans. Dating back to 1826, when Monsieur Jacques, the gardener to King Philipe of Spain, formerly the Duc d'Orleans, crossed two unknown old species or wild roses to produce this lovely climber. There were not many hybrid tea roses at the time.

White lupins are gallivanting through the garden. I don't mind and let them do what they like.
The Mock Orange [ Philadelphus] is still in full bloom this week. There are various kinds. The one I like best is P. aureum, with yellow leaves and small flowers with an incredible scent. The one I used here has larger flowers, but they are losing a bit of their perfume.

Such delicate richness - so pure. They make walking through the garden a delight.
I can't bear to think that in a little while these huge shrubs will be a dark green. Their leaves are ugly - no denying that.

the scent that greets me
on my path is fading
as the petals drop
their loss will drab
the weeks ahead

The two roses below I bred myself. They are unnamed and will remain so, as it is now too expensive to register roses. Besides, what's the point? I have no intention of selling or even showing them. Those days are gone.

And now for a bit of extravaganza in multiple vases to finish off with.

Voila, my bouquet put together from the following ingredients:

A branch of Kolkwitzia, the beauty bush shrub. A giant beast of a shrub, covering 400 square feet of the backgarden. It's in flower for a good three weeks and I adore it. At present the red bud tree, cercis siliquastrum, is trying to overlay one side of it and I shall have to tame that tree somehow.

A branch of this shrub, Deutzia "Rosamunde" which grows next to the vine house so that I can photograph it through the windows. When the glass gets mucky with green algae, it gives a nice patina to the picture. I know, I could get a similar effect with layers, but somehow I like the immediacy of an actual layer of dirt :-). Makes it look romantic, don't you agree? Besides, who likes washed windows. The birds certainly don't as they get a headache from the headbanging against clean windows.

Wisteria sinensis "Pink Ice", a 30 feet wide climber reaching for our roof, which covers the kitchen window at the front of the house. More about the Wisteria in the previous post HERE

Mock orange or Philadelphus, another giant shrub, covering 30 feet

Then I added a perfect bloom from Rosa 'Arthur Bell' [ a McGredy rose] plus its immaculate foliage [ won't be long before snails get to that shrub, even though I grow it inside the vine house, it is still not immune from pests.
I added 2 flowers from the deep purple/blue clematis Viola, and a piece of driftwood sticking out of the top of the concoction.

Then the whole thing fell apart and the rose started to drop its petals, so I simplified it a little as seen in the first photo at the top of the post.





My garden has developed into a matrix garden, where planting is concerned with successive layers of vegetation, one above the other, through which plants form multi-dimensional communities.


The concept of “matrix planting” is based upon models of natural vegetation types, wherein a variety of species grow together in harmony and in support of each other. Think of it as a fruitcake: small plants are distributed across the larger plant matrix like nuts and fruits are scattered through the fruitcake dough matrix.





Closer look at the Wisteria

The garden overwhelms me with its beauty.
Knowing how ephemeral flowers are, I walk round and round, covering miles during the day, not to miss a moment of these days of glory.

A huge Wisteria, with these subtle lavender/pink pendulants, covers my kitchen window. It is like living in a tree house. Birds can't see me inside when I'm doing the washing up. I can observe them unnoticed. The firecrest likes to take his exercise on the branches, using them like a gym.
This variety of Japanese Wisteria Rosea is one of the rare pink varieties and is fully hardy and withstanding temperatures down to circa -15 C

It is known as Wisteria Sinensis Rosea "Pink Ice" or Japanese Wisteria Floribunda Honbeni
As with all Wisteria varieties the best way to encourage prolific blooming in late Spring/early summer is to prune them back after flowering, really you can’t go wrong with the pruning – as even a hardy trim back will encourage a spurt of growth and lots
of flowers in the next season.

I always find this climber difficult to photograph. The flowers are so hidden behind the foliage.
Masses of them. I can see them better from the inside through the window, but never manage to get a good picture that way.
Spent hours on it this time, to pay it my respect as the flowers are so special.

There's much more, but I am running out of steam.
Hope these florals delight you as much as they do me.