Autumn is a great time of year to look for inspiration for additions to your own garden, and to plant as the ground is still warm. Do make sure you water anything newly planted in well, even if we have rain soon after planting.
Here are five of our favourite groups of plants that really stand out in the autumn months, and many into winter too :
Ornamental grasses are excellent ways of adding interest to your garden throughout autumn and winter. They provide gentle movement and texture to borders, they look beautiful in the autumn sunshine and when it starts to get frosty too. They’re a great addition to any garden as they will hold their structure through to the spring, when most of them need to be cut down ahead of the new growth – look out for our advice on this early next year!
For beauty and movement all through Autumn and Winter, Miscanthus really is your best friend! It’s beautiful fronds of flowers waft about gorgeously in the breeze, and most varieties hold onto their colour for a long time. This is Miscanthus sinensis ‘Yakushima Dwarf’ which has a more compact nature than others but is still a fairly chunky grass. There are several other equally lovely varieties including Miscanthus sinensis ‘Gracillimus’, and Miscanthus sinensus ‘Morning Light’.
We love calamagrostis varieties for their compact, tall, upright growth and straw-coloured flowers, miscanthus sinensis varieties for their beautiful pink tinged flowers that silver with age, and all the pennisetums for their gorgeous, fluffy and oh so tactile flowers which look wonderful softening the edges of borders.
There’s still much colour to be enjoyed at this time of year from later flowering perennials such as Sedum, Salvias, Asters, Japanese Anemones, Verbenas and more. Happily many of these are also excellent late nectar sources for pollinators too.
There are several different varieties of each of these to choose from and they are readily available to buy at garden centres and online now. If possible, try to choose a garden centre that’s using recyclable pots and peat-free compost. Some of our favourite varieties of these late flowering perennials include:
This is a stalwart of the Autumn garden – the flower heads begin as a lovely soft green in the summer, start turning to greeny-pink and then open to pink in late summer/early Autumn. Their colours keeps developing until reaching this reddish-pink hue later in the Autumn. They hold their shape all winter with fantastic structural seedheads, are super easy to propagate and are bullet-proof on heavy clay – what’s not to love?!
Providing colour and nectar for pollinators from mid-summer to the first frosts, shrubby Salvias are an absolute must for every garden. There are so many colours and varieties to choose from – here are just a couple of our favourites, we also love the varieties ‘Blue Note’, ‘Nachtvlinder’ and ‘Delice Aquamarine’.
Known for their long period and flowering and for attracting various pollinators, there are now numerous Verbenas available So as well as the ubiquitous, and still very worth having, Verbena bonariensis, why not try some of the lesser known varieties? We love Verbena bampton with it’s dark stems and more delicate flowers. All Verbenas can be left standing over winter for vertical interest in the garden, cutting them back right to the base as the new growth emerges in the Spring.
Another stalwart of the Autumn garden, providing lovely foliage for much of the year and flowering prolifically from late summer into early winter. Growing well in full sun and partial shade, they can be a great option for adding continuity and repetition throughout the garden. Here are two of our favourites. We also love the more compact ‘Swan’ series.
Some roses will keep flowering right up to early Winter or even to Christmas, but many also produce beautiful hips. These are the fruits of the rose and contain their seeds. As the flowers fade the hips swell and turn beautiful shades of orange or red. Not only are they beautiful to look at and provide a lovely pop of colour in the garden which persists as flowers are getting scarcer, but they are also an excellent food source for birds over Autumn and Winter.
When selecting a rose, some websites (including David Austin) will allow you to search for ones that produce hips. One of our favourites is Rosa Morning Mist which has a really striking coral-pink flower and goes on to produce large orange hips.
If you are not sure if your roses produce hips, you can stop deadheading them to allow the flowers to go over and give the hips a chance to form. Many of the shrub roses may be quite underwhelming but if you have any Rosa Rugosa or large bushy roses they may well produce beautifully coloured hips. It’s certainly worth seeing! Rosa Rugosa varieties are renowned for their stunning display of hips – they need some space but it’s well worth considering adding some to your garden if you can.
It’s not all about the flowers! Many deciduous tree and shrub species will be ablaze with colour during the Autumn. Trees such as Amelanchier, Acers, Liquidambar and flowering Prunus/cherry varieties can put on a riot of colour. These are also all great options for small-medium sized gardens, except Liquidambar which usually reaches a very large size at full maturity – however there are some smaller and fastigiate/upright varieties which are smaller, so if you have a larger garden they are definitely worth looking at for an amazing Autumnal feature.
As well as trees there are some really spectacular deciduous shrubs to choose from, which will have worked hard earlier in the year to give you blooms and interest, and now as they get ready to rest for the Winter they continue to delight – Hydrangeas and Viburnum Opulus are two very worth considering, and perhaps the best shrub for Autumn colour is Euonymous Alatus (sadly I don’t have a photo!).
Many trees and shrubs produce berries in the autumn. These are essential food sources for many birds and they look beautiful too. We love Hawthorn, Sorbus, Cotoneaster, Crab Apple and Pyracantha – which are all beneficial for wildlife in spring and autumn. There are many varieties of each to choose from. Hawthorn has beautiful vibrant red berries and you can choose from numerous Sorbus with different coloured berries ranging from red to orange to pink. Cotoneaster produces rich red berries set against dark green leaves, often evergreen or semi-evergreen.
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