Spring brings wealth of color choices for your garden

For those of us who love the gar­den, this is undoubt­edly the most excit­ing time of the year. Our land­scape under­goes a mag­nif­i­cent trans­for­ma­tion seem­ingly in the blink of an eye. Yel­low and dull lawns turn rich and emer­ald overnight. End­less expanses of grey begin to break with brave flashes of green buds. Bulbs like daf­fodil, hyacinth, and tulip sur­prise and delight us all in for­got­ten cor­ners. Fruit and orna­men­tal flow­er­ing trees look like float­ing clouds of white, pink, and yel­low. And my per­sonal favorite icon of the spring gar­den, for­sythia ignites in a vivid yel­low demand­ing atten­tion from even the most dis­in­ter­ested passerby. It seems hard to believe that regard­less of how harsh, or in this year’s case ­mild, the pre­vi­ous win­ter was, spring can always be counted on for a mes­mer­iz­ing spec­ta­cle. One of my favorite aspects of the wealth of color that spring gives us is the abil­ity to arrange plants of all dif­fer­ent vari­ety together based on color.

One of the most impor­tant ele­ments of suc­cess­ful gar­den­ing is to forego rules and sim­ply arrange your gar­den in the pat­tern (or lack thereof) that pleases you. My two very favorite schemes for gar­dens are gar­dens with solid blocks of color and mono­chro­matic gar­dens. Color block­ing and mono­chro­matic schemes have a lot in com­mon. In both styles plants are grouped together by sim­i­lar shade. What sep­a­rates a gar­den designed in color blocks from a mono­chro­matic gar­den is in block­ing there is very high con­trast between each ‘block’ of color. For exam­ple, in a gar­den with a mono­chro­matic color scheme all of the plants in that gar­den would be in sim­i­lar color fam­i­lies. In a color block­ing gar­den, a block of yellow-blooming plants might be placed next to a block of blue and violet-blooming plants for con­trast and impact. I enjoy these meth­ods as much for their beauty as their purpose.

The the­ory behind a gar­den planted in color blocks is that by see­ing a mass of a color next to a mass of its’ coun­ter­part (get out your color wheels!) you expe­ri­ence the full depth and impact of each color. One of my very favorite color block­ing com­bi­na­tions for a gar­den is vio­let and yel­low. Vio­let and yel­low are oppo­site one another on the color wheel and com­ple­ment each other beau­ti­fully. The warmth in the yel­low accen­tu­ates the cool, blue under­tones in the vio­let; and in turn the vio­let real­izes the full poten­tial of yellow’s warm impact. Color block­ing can be applied in dif­fer­ent ways for dif­fer­ent impact. The com­bi­na­tion of green and yel­low is of the great­est sen­si­tiv­ity to the human eye­ so if you are try­ing to increase curb appeal on your house that sits far off the street, adding yel­low to your land­scape will make your prop­erty more notice­able to peo­ple. Think how com­monly you see yel­low in adver­tis­ing, it is no acci­dent. That is why for­sythia in bloom has the abil­ity to cap­ture anyone’s atten­tion. Our eyes can­not help but focus on the lumi­nes­cent spot of yel­low in an oth­er­wise green land­scape. On the other hand, if you are aim­ing to cre­ate a tran­quil and calm gar­den, block­ing together cool hues like blue, vio­let, and white is your answer. Our eyes are amaz­ing feats of nature and the way our mood can be manip­u­lated by the col­ors we see is aston­ish­ing. Color block­ing is very pop­u­lar in fash­ion and home décor, but not as often seen trans­lated to a gar­den. It is a very fun and strik­ing way to enjoy the spec­trum nature has to offer.

In color block­ing, color is enhanced by con­trast. In a mono­chro­matic scheme, color is enhanced by tex­ture and the full range of the hue. Mono­chro­matic gar­dens are, and have always been, very pop­u­lar. They are peace­ful, beau­ti­ful, and fun to put together. Mono­chro­matic gar­dens can be cre­ated in whichever hue is your favorite and are very easy to plan. Any plant you find in that hue, regard­less of its’ light­ness or dark­ness, can be incor­po­rated. If one were to decide for instance he or she wanted a mono­chro­matic gar­den in shades of white, every shade of white nature gives would be wel­come. The bright white of annu­als like gera­nium or impa­tient against the soft white of roses and white lilac tied together with the ener­getic green-white of an Annabelle hydrangea makes for a stun­ning gar­den with the range and ver­sa­til­ity of white. Whereas color block­ing requires a bit more fore­sight and plan­ning, in a mono­chro­matic gar­den you can lit­er­ally add what­ever you would like as long as it is loosely within the same hue. When the human eye sees the same color in mul­ti­ple tex­tures and shades, it fully dis­cerns the depth and tone of that color. Also when all the blooms are of the same hue, the tex­tures of each indi­vid­ual plant are much more notice­able. The gloss of a var­ie­gated hosta leaf or the fuzzy stems of a fern are all of more inter­est to the eye when placed among one color.

Color is with­out a doubt nature’s great­est gift to the human eye. It has the power to cap­ti­vate, excite, and relax us. Gar­dens are the best place to enjoy the col­ors nature gives us, and with a lit­tle care­ful plan­ning we have the abil­ity to dis­play one or all of those col­ors to their full glory.

Stephen Jones is an Delaware County OSU Exten­sion Mas­ter Gar­dener volunteer.

Posted by Master Gardener on Mar 24 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.