My Planting List for the Second Hot Sunny Flower Bed

Mainly Drought-Tolerant Plants with a Few Surprises

Welcome to HOME & HORT, the place where we chat about interiors, gardening, renovation & design, with a little bit of life, love and fun thrown in for good measure. I’m currently renovating a 1500’s barn and walled garden.

Today is a ‘Garden’ post and it’s FREE to read. Most posts are for paid members. This Sunday will be my second ‘Mounjaro’ post. Why not join us full time?

Just a short mid-week post from me today. So much is going on in the garden I can’t quite keep up. All of a sudden everything seems to be happening at once. The gazebo, or garden canopy, as I like to call it, was built on Tuesday, I can’t wait to show you it. If you followed me when we lived in the Victorian house, then you’ll remember the garden canopy we had there. It’s very similar, but without most of the walls or the garden office attached. This video shows it a few minutes in.

I’m writing this on Wednesday morning. It’s supposed to bucket down with rain tomorrow when you receive this post, and I’ll be at The Harbour Deckhouse, our holiday home, cleaning and changing beds all day, ready for the next guests. This afternoon I need to get out there and paint the canopy as quickly as possible to protect it.

I need to get that finished so that all the plants waiting in the wings for the half-shady border, which is next to the canopy, can finally go in. It’s not quite an island bed, as it has the lovely tall stone wall as its backdrop, but it can be seen from three sides: across from within the canopy, from the lawn, and from the other side closest to the shed and Mr C’s border. It’s a strange border, as the front is sunny, but the back is heavily shaded. I’ll be planting that up this weekend, before deckhouse duty again on Sunday.

A Drought-Tolerant Border?

Today I want to give you the planting list for the second finished island bed. This one gets the most sun, pretty much all day, so it needs plants that are suitable. I will be watering heavily until established, but after that it needs to cope. In very hot weather I will still need to give the roses a drink, but other than that it’s on its own.

I’ve opted for quite a lot of drought-tolerant plants, but there’s a few that might surprise you like Hydrangea Paniculata Limelight. Contrary to popular belief, it copes perfectly well in a hot, sunny bed, in fact, I’d say it thrives, unlike its cousin Annabelle, which pleads for mercy.

Of course, it was important that this border used a similar language to the other two finished beds, so I have picked up the blues, but used Perovskia instead. I have linked the Paniculata bed by adding three Limelights, continued my use of Nepeta and hardy geraniums, which cope surprisingly well. I’ve added the dancing white butterfly blooms of Gaura, and the tall, square stems of Verbena Bonariensis to link Mr C’s border.

I’m just about to add a few dots of Ballota pseudodictamnus, which is lovely, slightly furry silver grey and creates mounds of mauve-pink flowers. It’s also evergreen and can cope with up to -10C. Our garden is so sheltered, so hopefully it’ll thrive. The website says the flowers are insignificant, but I’ve seen it in bloom and rather love it none the less.

In the far left corner you can see gravel turns to lawn. The grass there is temporary. In the end the gravel path will continue to the steps up to the house.

Here I wanted height so that a swathe of colour masks the wall of what hopefully will be a raised splash pool with a service path in between. I’ve used Lavatera x clementii ‘Lilac Lady’, whose petals are actually more baby pink, with a hint of mauve. There’s a large empty space for Rosa ‘Your Beautiful’, which I need to dig up once it goes into dormancy later this year and transplant. Fingers crossed on that one. I know it copes with full on heat as it’s currently directly behind this new bed.

At the far end I have added a stunning half standard Liquid Amber tree. In autumn its vibrant leaves of crimson, gold and rust will mirror the colours emanating from the Acer Autumn Blaze in the distance. Below and behind taller plants in some shade, I have added Hakonechloa macra, which is not drought- tolerant, but can cope with some dry spells. I love the colour it goes in autumn, so I’m really hoping it’ll be okay there. I’ve used it to pick up the same grass in the half-shady border. Anyway, here’s the full list:

Planting List

Perennials and grasses

Nepeta Marvelette Blue

Perovskia Blue Spire

Perovskia Little Spire

Geranium Rozanne

Erigeron Karvinskianus

Verbena Bonariensis

Verbena Polaris Sky Blue

Deschampsia cespitosa 'Bronze Veil'

Hakonechloa macra (In half-shade)

Knautia Macedonica Red Knight

Stachys byzantina 'Silver Carpet'

Gaura lindheimeri 'Sparkle White'

Ballota pseudodictamnus

Shrubs

Hebe rakaiensis

Hydrangea Paniculata ‘Limelight’

Lavatera x clementii ‘Lilac Lady’ (Sub shrub)

Roses

Gentle Hermione

Rosa Burgundy Ice

Rosa Your Beautiful (once it’s dug up and transplanted)

If you missed the full planting list for the largest island bed, then you can find that here, along with a full video.

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I’ll be back this Sunday with the two-month Mounjaro update I promised you. If you missed the first one you can find it here. I’ll also hopefully see you at 5.30pm this Friday (UK time) for Post It and Smile over on our private chat here. I show a photo of something that has made me happy this week and then everyone else joins in. It’s a lot of fun. Come and join us.

Thank you all so much for all your support. Do leave a heart 🩷, a restack 🔄 and a comment 💬 if you have a moment.