Evergreen shrubs provide texture, but they aren't always green.
When it comes to the garden, a textured plant refers to the form, structure and feel of a plant. Texture in the garden is extremely important because, other than the blooms, texture is what gives a plant, and the garden, its appeal. Textured plants could have large blue puckard leaves such as Hosta ‘Abiqua Drinking Gourd’ or pointed blades like that of Japanese Blood Grass. The leaves of a textured plant can be fuzzy, fine, thick, rough, shiny, lacy, puckered, or wrinkled.
There are many varieties of textured plants, including annuals, perennials, ground covers, ornamental grasses, bulbs, shrubs and trees. Once the flowering cycle of a plant is over; gardeners are left with brown flowers, leaves and stems, or green foliage. Adding texture to the garden will create a visual interest even after the blooms are long gone and the perennials are cut back.
Planting with foliage of different textures and colors together is called contrast planting. Contrast planting adds a whole new dimension to your garden by using a mixture of textures, shapes, and colored foliage. There are spotted, striped or variegated plants used often for contrast planting.
Annuals such as coleus, summer bulbs like caladiums, and vegetables like sweet potato vine are often used in pots by urban gardeners to add brilliant texture and contrast without worrying about bloom.
Textured Foliage in the Shade Garden
Many avid gardeners have grown to love shade gardens because most shade-loving plants are textured. They are not known for their blooms, but more for the texture of their leaves. Some textured shade perennials are hostas, ladies mantle, corydalis, tiarella, ferns, brunnera, toad lily, columbine, dicentra, helleborus, arum, pulmonaria, epimedium, and variegated Jacob’s ladder. These perennials will provide your garden with an assortment of textured foliage all summer long and well into fall. Many of these are also groundcovers. Other Groundcovers with great texture are ginger, ajuga, lamium, pachysandra, vinca, and ferns. These shade-loving perennials are great for added texture around trees, along paths, or on banks.
Textured Foliage in the Sunny Perennial Bed
There are a variety of sun-loving perennials that have textured foliage and beautiful blooms such as coreopsis, astilbe, dianthus, artemesia, lambs ears, heuchera, and perennial geranium, just to name a few. Ice Plant and a large variety of sedum are textured favorites that serve as a groundcover in a sunny garden. Ornamental grasses such as bamboo, pampas grass, Japanese Blood Grass, mondo grass, varegated liriope, and blue fescue are certain to add texture and interest to any landscape.
Textured Shrubs
Evergreen shrubs can add color and texture to the landscape. In this instance, the word “evergreen shrub” is oxymoron because evergreen shrubs are not always green. There are evergreen shrubs such as gold cypress and blue junipers that boast color throughout the year; and they are not green by any stretch of the imagination. Other “so-called” evergreen shrubs such as photinia and nandina will pop in the landscape with their dainty feathery-like leaves and add beautiful color and texture. Deciduous shrubs such as yellow-twig and red twig dogwood add color and texture in the fall/winter garden due to the color of their twigs and branches. While other textured decidous shrubs, like Harry Lauder Walking Stick, have no color, but its twisted and corked branches will stop any passerby. There are many textured broadleaf evergreens, variegated evergreens and colored evergreens. Almost any variegated plant or shrub, such as variegated holly, is certain to add contrast in the landscape.
So when planning your next garden or landscape makeover; color, contrast, and texture are the keys to an interesting and eye-catching garden. Remember it’s not all about the blooms.
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