Plant Combinations

So you know what you want, and you have a shady yard or a sunny yard or a partially shady yard. So many options. If you go to a garden center the options can be overwhelming. What do you plant? Where do you plant it? How do you plant it?

First questions first. What do you plant?
Deciding which companion plants to select for a spot in your yard often comes down to personal taste and preferences, but knowing a few design principles will help ensure a successful design and plants that thrive together.First, it is important to choose companion plants that have the same light, water and soil needs. Make sure the plants will thrive in your climate zone and site conditions. Going with native plantings is always a good choice because they have evolved to withstand the weather in our area.  

In this picture... Shasta daisies, Bee balm and Black eyed susans (not in bloom). All are summer flowering perennials they love sunlight, great for a south facing yard, they attract butterflies and bees...

After you find these plants.Then you can move on to blending plant characteristics, including plant shape, size, texture and color. By combining plants that are similar in one or more of these categories and different in others, you’ll be on your way to achieving a winning plant combination. 

In this picture and this garden, i chose to color block the plants, two reasons for this:

1- i like big groups of plants together as opposed to inter-planted and staggered

2- Bees are more attracted to grouped plants, they see them better. Since i'm a big believer in organic planting and attracting as many bees (which are dying off) to my yard i do all i can to accommodate them.

In this view its the Shasta side, there's also some liatris planted in corners but more on that later...

All these plants have summer blooming in color, but they are very different in their growing habits, bee balm is tall and airy with the birdlike flowers, the daisies are tall and columnar, and the black eyed susans are dense and shrubby.
Im going to list now some possible plant combinations for a sunny yard:

Liatris+Milkweed+Lavender (great for butterflies and other pollinators)
Knockout Roses+Rosemary+creeping Jenny
Salvia+Black eyed Susan+Gaura
Sedum+Blue fescue (very drought tolerant)
Speedwell+Gaillardia+Pink Zinnias
Boxwood+Hydrangeas+grasses (also works in part shade)
Heucheras+ Savannah Grass+Geraniums (also tolerates part shade)
Coneflower+coreopsis+ornamental grasses
Sky pencil Holly+salvia+creeping thyme
Hollyhock+barberry+Ajuga

Combinations for shady yard:
Hostas+allium+bleeding heart
Hostas+calla Lillies+Astilbe
Ferns+ Coleus
Brunera+Bleeding heart
Japanese forest grass+lady's mantle+geranium
Heuchera+pulmonaria

The combinations are endless. Some people like to combine the same plant but all different colors, like red coneflowers with pink, white yellow ones. Or different color Zinnias, its always fun when the yard is colorful. Some people opt to make different plant combinations that have the same colors, for example Leucanthemum, with chamomille and white Dahlias or carnations. It all depends on the look you want. 

Its a good idea to use a limited color scheme for example pic 3 colors, in the pictures i showed i have red white and yellow. Originally i wanted only red and purple in my yard to complement my door color. But the yellow and white flowers won me over.

its also a good idea to borrow from nature, this is along Van Dorn street, this is chicory with the blue flowers and queen Anne's lace. It'd be nice to apply this color scheme in a garden all blue and white which can be done using  blue flowers like blue morning glory vine or Hydrangeas and getting other white flowers like white callas, or white peonies.

Now Where do you plant it?
This is a fun question always. cause the answer is anywhere you want. usually in a planting bed. As a general good gardening rule you should make sure the soil is adequate for the plants needs, meaning is it wet? doe sit drain well? how much water does it get, is it sandy, loamy, clay? For most plants loamy and well draining is best option. But some plants tolerate drought, some like wet roots. its important to have a nice bed for your plants and to mulch, mulch does so much good, first it prevents weeds from cropping up, it also minimizes water evaporation from the soil so the plants stay happier, and lastly depending on the mulch as it breaks down it adds organic matter into the soil which helps the plants in the long run. The scale of the plants must be taken into consideration too, you shouldn't plant a huge tree in a small little plot, although some tall plants such as Hollyhocks are nice specially if planted with medium shrubs like barberry and a grown cover like Ajuga.


How do you plant it you ask?

As a general rule of thumb you want to plant things in a garden bed from tallest to shortest starting from the back. But this isn't a hard rule you can do tall on the side, and medium on the opposite side and short in the middle etc. but this is all up to you and the look you want. you can go with a formal garden, or a cottage garden look or something sleek and minimal. Another rule of thumb is plant in groups of three its supposedly a design rule that is more pleasing to the eye. I think groups of 3 has worked for me. You can either do the 3 tall plants in the back then medium then short just offsetting them to the side so that they show more. Or again do the 3 3 and 3 side by side.

This house in old town has a nice little front planting bed, its a perfect example of tall-medium-short rule. The plants on each side are oak-leaf hydrangeas, the one in the middle is a boxwood, the purplish ones are barberry which they keep trimmed down and the shortest is a creeping juniper. 

This bed is a good example of different textures, and colors. it will have color all year because of the evergreen juniper and the boxwood, and the showy blooms of the hydrangea keep it interesting in summer. In the fall the barberry turns an intense red color too.

Planting beds are best defined by personal style and environmental conditions. You can opt for all evergreens low maintenance, or just do a boxwood hedge, or go crazy with all sorts of different flowers. You cant go wrong with roses neither but they are a little difficult to keep in our micro-climate unless they're knockout roses which are pretty disease resistant.  Again this is all optional and up to your tastes and what you and your yard can, handle.