Vibrant boxes, alive with colour, will transform a simple windowsill into an eye-catching display of flowers and foliage — from inside and out.

Troughs laden with flowers offer a bright and cheerful welcome

Too pretty to hide, this picket- fence window box has country cottage charm. Creamy white Asarina procumbens trail through the slats in contrast with the dark red Lobelia ‘Fan Scharlach’ and chocolate cosmos.

A regiment of primulas lined up along a sill will brighten many a dull winter’s day and makes a pretty alternative to a traditional trough.

Plain colour schemes often work best in a confined space like a window box. Here, white begonias and geraniums, with a touch of lilac lobelia, make an elegant summer display.

Strong plants are needed to withstand autumn weather. Here dwarf conifers draw the eye to the glossy pink berries of Pernettya mucronata while glowing purple erica makes a miniature hedge.

A format stone trough with its winter display of clipped box can be livened up instantly in spring by tucking a few bright polyanthus in at the front.

A sizzling mass of bright fuchsias, geraniums, mimulus and nasturtiums screens this window from passers-by as effectively as a net curtain would.

A sitting snugly on a sill or fixed to the wall beneatha window, offers the chance to change your outlook with every season and to enhance the facade of your home.

The most attractive window boxes are often those in which the colours are vibrant and the vigour of the plants creates a swirling mass that obscures the box and almost envelops the window it is dressing. But if you are attaching a box below a window that opens outwards, be careful to site it low enough, so that you can still open the window when the plants mature.

Window boxes are long, thin, usually not very deep, and hold a relatively small amount of soil, so they need slow-release fertilizer granules, as well as water- retaining gel or granules incorporated into the mix.

Make sure that a window box sited on the front of the house is securely fixed with brackets or iron restraints.

This will keep it safe from theft and will prevent endangering the people walking beneath it.

If you live above other people, or if your window box overhangs a pavement, it may be a good idea to equip the box with a drip tray: it will be no fun for neighbours to be caught under a shower each time you water the flowers.

Try to fix your window box into position before you plant it up — it may be impossibly heavy to move later. If the box is for a ground-floor window it will be easy to work on it from the outside. But if you live higher up, you may need to throw the windows wide open and work from inside.

CONCENTRATED STYLE

Even in the confined space of a window box it is possible to create a variety of styles. A limited palette of one colour plus foliage plants — for example, a rich red geranium with ivy — would provide a vibrant, yet formal style and will have most impact when viewed from a distance. Pastel petunias, with lobelia in complementary colours, and trails of fuchsia, suggest a more relaxed, country style.

Silver and grey is a deservedly popular colour combination for foliage in window boxes. Add a white or cream variegated ivy or white-flowered lobelia to add highlights to a cool contemporary display.

For a south-facing window use ivy, box or busy lizzies, which all thrive in shade, as well as ferns, and cyclamen. In full sun try the floriferous diascias in a range of pastel colours.

Seed pans, wicker baskets and basins make ideal homes for small plants. Choose these containers for succulents and seaside plants, which won’t mind if the shallow soil dries out from time to time on hot sunny days.

A stone Venus gazes across a sea of low pots filled with a selection of rockery plants and small succulents.

A terracotta box (1) houses a clump of late-flowering Angélique’ tulips, while a basket (2) of low-growing sedums and pinks makes a pretty outdoor table decoration. Bonsai trees (3) need very little soil for their roots and grow best in shallow pots.

Bowls and low troughs show off the smaller treasures of the garden, such as small succulents, mat-forming plants and low-growing bulbs, to their best advantage. A group of shallow pots of just one type of plant, such as houseleeks (sempervivums), set out on a patio becomes a textured ornament.

Stone troughs are rectangular and about 15- 20cm (6-8in) deep. They are expensive (and not easy to find), but old Victorian sinks are a popular alternative — and come complete with plughole drainage. Most plugholes, however, are so large that water and soil will drain rapidly away so it is best to cover them with broken crocks or a piece of fine wire mesh.

Ceramic sinks can be used as they are or coated with a cement mix to produce a more traditional weathered look. If weight is an issue, it is easy to coat a light plastic or polystyrene base with the cement mix or make a mock stone trough.

Troughs should be raised off the ground on bricks to improve drainage and to keep the bottom free of slugs and other pests.

Small plants, such as pinks — Dianthus alpinus, D. deltoides and D. neglectus — grow well in shallow containers. Thrifts are also good choices, and form softly textured foliage mounds with flower stems rising up out of the clump.

Mat-forming plants such as houseleeks, saxifrages and creeping thymes with their subtle range of foliage

Colours are well suited to shallow containers, where they spread in mounds and rosettes, as well as in ground-covering mats.

Seed pans, popular wide, shallow terracotta pots, which can be round or square, provide a shapely setting for spring bulbs. Because they are small and easy to carry, they can be brought into position near the house just as the flower buds start to open.

Low-growing bulbs such as Iris reticulate, closely planted and in a single colour, look like jewels set in these shallow bowls. Tulips growing out of a sea of blue forget-me- nots will also provide good spring colour, as will collections of dwarf, multi- flowered and species tulips.

When the spring bulbs have finished flowering, plant delicate pink or white Cyclamen coum for autumn and winter pleasure.

Capture the spirit of autumn with a clourful harvest of decorative fruit and vegetables. Choose inedible varieties you won’t be tempted to pick, and enjoy this display on chillu autumn days.

A wiggy basket evokes the spirit of harvest festival when it is filled to overflowing with an autumn bounty of vegetables and fruits, both edible and inedible.

Ericas and pernettya thrive in acid soil while the peppers in this arrangement do not. The peppers were sunk into the display while still in their own pots, each filled with the standard potting soil they prefer.

Shiny scarlet and orange peppers and crinkly purple cabbages make an exotic take on the traditional harvest-festival basket in the main arrangement on the right. The pepper used is Capsicum annuum, the ornamental pepper. These are, in fact, edible (although not necessarily tasty), but be sure not to confuse this pepper with Solanum pseudocapsicum whose fruits are extremely poisonous.

Ornamental peppers vary in colour and shape from the long tapering red hot chilli peppers to the cone-shaped peppers used here, which are white or green when immature and eventually turn scarlet or purple.

Gathering the Fruits

The bare branches of late autumn trees are echoed by a rustic planter — a loosely woven twiggy basket — which adds to the sense of a newly gathered autumn harvest. The basket has been lined with dyed sisal fibre, a longer- lasting and more environmentally friendly choice than moss. Plant the cabbages and peppers close together for maximum impact and to help retain moisture: this is an arrangement that needs to be kept well watered.

In frost-prone areas, keep the basket raised above ground level and place it in a sheltered spot — perhaps near a back door or under a kitchen window. All these plants are annuals and are best discarded after two or three months or as soon as frost strikes.

A Splash of Red

In the alternative arrangement, ornamental peppers add brilliance to a pair of glazed pots filled with the perennial evergreens Erica gracilis and Gaultheria mucronata.

The pink sheen of the gaultheria berries, the glossy peppers and the oily blue-green glaze on the pots all work together to give a superbly rich effect. You can leave the peppers in their individual pots and sink them into the soil: the rims will be completely hidden. Once the peppers fade, they can be removed, leaving small empty pots in which you can plant winter pansies or spring bulbs to keep the arrangement going for as long as the erica looks good.

The erica (or heather), Erica gracilis, is a compact bushy plant with tiny urn-shaped flowers that appear in autumn and continue through to spring. Gaultheria mucronata needs to be planted in groups to ensure cross- pollination, if it is to produce its masses of white, pink, red or mulberry-purple berries.

A visual autumn feast can be as bright as any summer collection. For the best display choose pepper plants with fully formed fruits; they will last for between four and six weeks, or until the first really cold snap.

The term ‘bulb’ includes corms, rhizomes and tubers — all of which store food beneath the ground during periods of drought and dormancy (see box, far right). They are mostly associated with spring, but the autumn-flowering plants in the main arrangement on the facing page grow from corms.

The poppy-like white anemone, strappy liriope and black ophiopogon originate from China and Japan. They have been planted in a wide, shallow bowl to create an appropriately oriental effect.’

All these plants grow best in a rich, slightly acid soil. This needs to be kept moist, so in a rare dry autumn you will probably have to water the pot regularly as moisture will evaporate fast from this large surface area.

Anemone `Honorine Jobert’, planted in the centre of the bowl, is a beautiful hardy perennial with single white flowers, tinged with pink on the underside and with golden-yellow stamens.

Unlike daffodils and other spring bulbs, which / store energy from their dying foliage, anemones need to be cut right down to ground level after flowering.

However, because this anemone is surrounded by a ring of evergreen perennials — both members of the lily family — any gap left in the arrangement will be well disguised. Liriope muscari Variegata’ has narrow, glossy dark green and yellow variegated leaves with dense spikes of bright violet-mauve long-lasting flowers; Ophiopogon planiscapus `Nigrescens’ has dramatic black grass-like leaves. In late summer this plant produces spires of lilac flowers which are followed by round fleshy black fruits.

This arrangement is best planted in early summer to allow plants to establish — most hate being repotted when close to, or in, flower.

Pots in Dappled Light

In an alternative planting on the left a group of matching pots in various sizes brings together a diverse collection.

Many grasses are at their best in autumn when their fluffy heads sway in the breeze — although they can get tatty if they are exposed to strong winds. The elegant waving grass, Pennisetum alopecuroides ‘Hameln’, with its soft plume-like flowerheads in the golden yellow of wheat, likes full sun, as does the white Cyclamenpersicum which is in the smallest pot, so these occupy the foreground where there is most light.

Behind them, the graceful white anemone, Honorine Jobert’, makes an ideal container companion for Blechnum spicant (hard fern). Both are happy growing in the dappled shade at the edge of a stoep or patio.

Buried Stores of Energy

Bulbs, which plants like daffodils grow from, are made up of fleshy leaf bases.

Corms, from plants such as cyclamen, are swollen stems with buds at the top.

Rhizomes are fat stems that creep horizontally, such as those of irises.

Tubers are thickened roots, found in plants like dahlias.

Use plants as a decorative feature at Christmas. Plant festive container arrangements to decorate the house, stoep and patio and give visitors a cheery welcome.

Rich, deep colours are the traditional choice for decorating at Christmas time and scarlet poinsettias, Euphorbia pulcherrima, have become a part of the festive season. But the apricot and cream tones of the marble poinsettia used in the main arrangement on the right, and the soft pink of the smaller one in front of it, bring a new twist to the tradition. These subtle shades set the tone for a soft-coloured indoor display for a bright window.

At the centre of the display stands an Amaryllis `Apple Blossom’ flanked by two coppery square pots of Phalaenopsis orchids. Each amaryllis bulb produces one or two thick stems with huge, sweet-smelling blooms, but the flowerheads can be rather top heavy and may appreciate the support of metal flower markers or long twigs, which look more attractive than the usual bamboo canes.

Phalaenopsis orchids, which are also known as moth orchids, are perfect for this collection as they tolerate shade and are quite happy with good indirect light, which also suits the amaryllis and poinsettia. Their heads nod on slender stems and fill the centre of the arrangement.

Seasons Greetings

Bringing seasonal cheer to your home does not have to be restricted to the indoors. In the grouping on the left, two spruce Christmas trees stand on steps leading up to a front door drawing guests into the house. Instead of spruce, plant two welcoming small juniper trees at the entrance. They are available at all nurseries and will last from one year to the next.

Thick bows of dyed garden raffia add a further festive touch to the green and silver colour scheme, and break the hard lines of he tapered pots.

Al Silvered rims

Pick up the glint of the fine tinsel draped through the branches of these spruces. Small junipers work just as well. Pinecones scattered on the ground around the pots add to the traditional feel of the arrangement.

Add a touch of festive paint

A metallic varnish was rubbed onto the square terracotta pots featured here, to give a warm copper glow that enhances the pink tones of the blooms. A scattering of shimmering wooden apples and hazelnuts completes the display.

Tall stems of the amaryllis

Bring height to this arrangement, with the pale pinky white trumpet-shaped flowerheads drawing the eye to the top of the collection.

Be creative when choosing pots. Add excitement to your garden, by re-using worn-out or unwanted objects, from both outside and inside the home, in an unexpected way.

In an informal, relaxed garden or patio, there is no limit to the creativity of the container gardener. Virtually anything can be pressed into service as a plant-growing opportunity by the keen gardener, whether designed for the purpose or not. Even the remains of broken flowerpots can make very effective containers for sedums and low-growing plants.

Any pot you choose will need to have drainage holes cut or drilled into its base to ensure that the compost doesn’t become waterlogged. Alternatively, you can use the quirky container as a cover to hide a less exciting inner pot. In this case the outer container will retain any rainwater, so will need to be checked and emptied regularly to prevent any plants‘ roots being swamped.

Whatever the container, make sure it is clean, that all paint is removed from any old paint cans and that wooden containers have not been treated with chemicals that damage plants. Clean off any rust from iron containers using a wire brush, then apply a rust proofing paint to the surface.

You can also use more flimsy containers such as wooden trugs as short-term planters. Line them with plastic so that the wood on the interior of the basket is not damaged by wet soil and tuck in colourful summer bedding plants for a quick effect.

The kitchen is a fine place to raid for suitable containers. Pots and pans can make instant plant pots and teapots are just the right size for a few daffodil bulbs: set them near the house for a bright, visible display in spring.

China or enamel washbowls are also the perfect shape for holding bulbs. Wire wine racks, found in bric-a-brac shops, are becoming popular as holders for handfuls of small pots, each with a striking individual flower. And even if a recycled container such as a stack of car tyres, a plastic bucket or washing- up bowl is ugly when empty, you can soon disguise it with trailing plants.

There are numerous agricultural items that can be picked up at country sales and transformed into successful plant containers. Feeders for horses, or mangers, make large and attractive basket-type planters to fix to walls, while the long troughs used for chicken feed make excellent shallow homes for creeping thyme or chives.

Suspended anywhere from a door to a tree, baskets of flowers have an old-fashioned appeal. But with the right plants and container, the hanging basket can have a place in even the most modern of settings.

Successful basket can be so luxuriant at the height of summer that the chains and container are hidden and the whole confection seems to be floating on air. Hanging baskets are the most popular garden ornaments and several matching ones grouped along the front of a house or on a pergola have great dramatic impact. But just one carefully considered basket can be enough to add interest to a front entrance. If you are hanging a basket by a door, position it away from head-height.

A basket does not hold much potting soil and dries out rapidly, so it should be watered at least once a day.

If your basket is out of reach, you will need a long-handled watering device, a bracket that enables you to lower the basket, or a permanent irrigation system.

To make your task less arduous, choose plants that will thrive even if water is in short supply. There are numerous drought-tolerant bedding plants, which will flower all summer. Begonias, brachyscome, busy lizzies, felicia, geraniums, nasturtiums, petunias and verbena are all suitable.

There are also a number of ways to increase the water-holding capacity of your soil. Select the largest basket possible: the more soil you have, the longer it will take to dry out. Use a moisture-retentive liner for the basket, such as fibre or foam. Fibre basket liners are sold at nurseries. Their looks can be improved by covering them with moss. Finally, mix water-retaining gel or granules into the soil.

Great Plants to Fill or Soften the Edges of a Hanging Basket

• Upright plants
• Begonia
• Geraniums
• Heuchera
• Impatiens
• Petunia

Trailing plants

• Begonia x tuberhybrida `Pendula’
• Bidens ferulifolia
• Campanula
• Fuchsia
• Ivy-leaved geraniums
• Glechorna hederacea
• Helichrysum petiolare (green and yellow)
• Small leaf or variegated ivies
• Lobelia
• Nasturtium
• Scaevola
• Black-eyed Susan (Thunbergia a Iota)
• Verbena
• Viola

Naturally trailing plants can also be encouraged to climb. Wind their stems around the chains of the basket to give your display added height.

Flowers offer the container gardener not only colour but also texture and shape. When planning a display, you need to look at the size of the plants, the outline of their flowers and whether the foliage is glossy or muted. Striking a balance between colour, texture and shape can create a beautiful tapestry effect.

You could plant a container to resemble a luxurious bouquet, for instance, using spear-shaped lupins, bell-like campanulas or petunias, daisy-shaped gazanias and the pompoms of alliums or scabious, all in different colours. Or plant an arrangement such as the pots of cool-coloured lime lovers, where the colours harmonise but the contrast of different shapes reverberates with excitement.

Colour and Season

The effect of light at different times of the year can also influence the look of an arrangement. In spring the soft cool quality of the light suits bright colours — yellow daffodils and red tulips look bright and fresh early in spring whereas they might look harsh in summer. The pinks, lilacs and mauves so popular in summer containers seem to cool the atmosphere on a hot, a sunny day. And in the autumn months, glowing reds and bronzes are particularly effective.

One of the joys of container gardening is that colour schemes can be changed from one season to another or even during the same season. A bare brick wall seen from indoors during winter could be made attractive with variegated climbing ivies. In summer these could form the background for flowering climbers, such as roses or clematis, morning glory or sweet peas.

Sometimes a shrub creates year-round colour opportunities for a container garden. Skimmia japonica and Viburnum davidii both have neat shapes and evergreen interest, but also produce flowers in spring and autumn fruits. A pot of creamy daffodils, narcissi or hyacinths would emphasise either plant’s tiny spring flowers. In autumn the red berries of the skimmia could be highlighted with miniature red cyclamen, and the blue viburnum fruits set off with metallic blue pansies or violas.

Lavender is another good choice for year-round interest. It can be teamed with different plants as the seasons change and as the lavender itself shifts from stark silvery foliage to a mass of rich purple blooms.

Colours, shapes and textures combine in glorious container displays to lift the spirit, whatever the season.

One pot of plants looks hot and sunny, another cool and restful. The versatility of container gardening means you can introduce any colour you please to create exactly the look you desire.

Different colours conjure up very different emotions, so decide what mood you want to create before you choose any plants and pots. Bright yellows, oranges and reds will dominate any setting and are described as ‘advancing’ colours. Blues, mauves and greens are known as `receding’ colours, because they appear to withdraw into the background. If you position a pot of red flowers close at hand and one of blues in the distance, the eye is cheated into thinking that the vista is longer than it really is.

The intensity of natural light also has an impact on how we perceive colour. Hot and fiery colours have impact in the midday sun, while at twilight misty blues and mauves radiate a more subtle glow. White flowers and silver foliage look luminous in shade, drawing the eye. White also glows magically at night, making it the perfect colour for plantings that will be seen mainly in the evening.

Monochrome Arrangements

A scheme based around a single colour can create a distinctive feel. For example, a combination of bleached timber, silver and grey foliage and white and blue flowers can induce a feeling of peacefulness.

As a general rule, receding colours can be used together in greater quantity than advancing ones. A terrace filled entirely with scarlet flowers might look stimulating but it would soon become tiring on the eyes. However, shades of pink, tempered with touches of cerise and magenta, would be stimulating but never overpowering. Similarly, a splash of an advancing colour, such as yellow, adds a cheerful and welcoming note to any display, outside a front door, for instance, or for a window box in the depths of winter.

Though plants have inspiring scents and shapes, they make their impact with colour. Follow these simple rules to using colour with flair.

For a successful colour combination use the wheel as your guide and mix only opposite (complementary) or adjacent (harmonious) shades. Green is the neutral of the plant world, but can still have impact.

Understanding the impact colour can have is a skill. Some people have a natural eye for colour, and mix and match colour schemes by instinct, but most of us have to learn by experimenting until we achieve the desired effect. A good place to start when putting colours together — in the garden or anywhere else — is by studying the colour wheel, which is based on the natural spectrum of the rainbow.

Schemes in which the use of colour is restrained are usually more successful than those that combine a riot of different colours and shades. The most memorable plantings often use colours that are next to, or close by, each other on the colour wheel. Such neighbouring colours are sympathetic to one another, rather than fighting for attention, and create naturally harmonious planted arrangements.

A late-summer harmonious arrangement could be achieved by filling a dark burgundy container with carmine red and dark cerise dahlias and placing it in front of a background of maroon-tinged foliage, such as cotinus. Here all the colours are in sympathy because they are close together on the colour wheel. Another way to achieve harmony is to use shades of a single colour.

For a dramatic look, choose colours that are directly opposite each other on the colour wheel. These contrasting pairs are known as complementary colours, because they work together to create maximum impact. You could mix yellow and purple using daffodils and irises, or orange and blue by putting nasturtiums with lavender.

Add a Splash of Colour

Including a small amount of a contrasting colour in an otherwise harmonious arrangement produces a dash of excitement. The mainly burgundy arrangement described earlier, for instance, would really come alive if you added one or two bright marigolds or orange-centred gazanias to the planting mix.

To achieve the strongest display of pure or saturated colour, pack the container with flowers of similar colours but different shapes. But remember that saturated colour can be tiring after a while, so an arrangement or collection of pots is often more successful if it is broken up with a paler shade, or muted with a darker one.

To create a really restful effect with your container arrangements, combine different flowers in a range of similar colours and use lots of green foliage to give the arrangement natural balance.

White is a powerful and eye- catching colour — adding a white flower will provide definition in almost any display. But it can be overpowering if used in a block, except in a dark corner. Most white daisies have dark or yellow centres for relief, but you can also soften the stark effect of an all- white arrangement by including green or silvery foliage, or the velvety, richly coloured leaves of a variegated coleus.