The Complete Encyclopedia of Flower Gardening - Expert Guide to Growing Beautiful Blooms for Home Gardens, Landscaping & Outdoor Decor

You can achieve a cottage effect in the heart of the city as well as the suburbs. All you need is a passion for plants and a willingness to mix them all up. While English-style gardens draw heavily on hardy perennials, you can accomplish the same look of artful chaos with any plants appropriate to your climate. Indeed, Mediterranean plants and succulents like agaves work quite well in coastal and desert plantings. A traditional cottage garden can morph to fit your own personal gardening style. How long does it take to create a show-quality cottage garden? About 18 months and most of that is growing time. Darcy Daniel created year-round interest in her garden by using plants that hold their places in the off-season. Perennials and shrubs form a multilayered tapestry of flowers and foliage in her front front yard. Mauve blooms of Erysimum linifolium 'Variegatum' and the burgundy leaves of New Zealand flax can be backed by white 'Iceberg' rose, yellow-flowered Achillea 'Moonshine', and the violet blooms of Allium 'Globemaster'. South African plants work in Alan and Angelika Wilkinson's exotic cottage garden in Los Angeles. The trick: Using multiple varieties and planting them for an unstudied effect. African daisies with reddish orange flowers skirt the front, and Aloe marlothii with saffron-colored flower spikes and kalanchoe with pink bell-shaped blossoms fill in behind. Surrounding: Evergreen shrubs, New Zealand tea tree (Leptospermum scoparium 'Ruby Glow'), Leucadendron 'Safari Sunset', and a treelike protea.