How To Create A Perfume Packed Garden That Will Smell Fabulous This Year
When we choose plants at the garden centre, it’s usually because we attracted to their eye-catching foliage or boldly-coloured flowers, However, the showiest of plants are often disappointingly scent-free, which means you end up with a garden that may looks bright and gorgeous, but doesn’t satisfy your sense of smell.
Buying fragrant plants for borders and containers will create a satisfyingly sensuous plot. And it won’t just be popular with you – bees and butterflies will love scented plants, too. If space is limited, or if you simply want to create a scented container for a kitchen garden, fragrant herbs, such as lemon balm, golden oregano and tricolor sage work wonderfully on a smaller scale and are great for aromatic salads, too.
All fragrant plants need protection from the wind for you to enjoy their scent to the full, so choose the most sheltered parts of the garden for creating your perfumed flowerbeds, corridors and sitting areas. The ideal sites are against walls, around a sheltered patio or in window boxes. Alternatively, create natural screens – trees, hedges and evergreen shrubs all make good scent-savers. Read on to discover the best buys for every part of your garden.
Easy-grow plants for scent and colour
Summer-flowering perennials, such as clove-scented pinks, peppery lupins and lemon verbena, and bedding plants like wallflowers and cherry-pie scented heliptrope are ideal choices for your borders. For showy plants, choose lilies – the white ones are the most highly scented. The Madonna lily (Lilia candidum) has stunning white trumpet blooms on tall stems, and the Lilium longiflorum has an irresistible jasmine scent.
Line paths with aromatic herbs
Lavender, catmint, clary sage and lemon balm all release scent when brushed against – as does rosemary, an ideal plant to grow as a low, clipped hedge around a gateway to the garden. Plant grey-green southernwood (Artemesia arbrotanum) too, which releases its sweet aroma at the slightest touch. Creeping carpets of woolly thyme and camomile are irresistible places to sit, and release sensational perfumes when walked on – plant small patches in low-traffic areas of the lawn. For best results, put camomile plants a maximum of 15cm apart; water well until established, then cut back regularly to encourage compact growth.
Surround patios with a heady fragrance
Fix trellis all around your patio and grow a mixture of scented climbers to enjoy both during the day and the evening. Try the moon flower (Ipomoea alba): its trumpet-shaped blooms open at night and fill the air with fragrance. Old favourites like wisteria and jasmine will lace the air with sweet scents, too, but for a heady perfume on balmy summer evenings, plant star jasmine (Trachelopsermum jasminoides). Bedding plants provide scent and colour, so fill pots, baskets and window boxes with petunias, stock, Nemesia, marigolds, heliotrope and trailing snapdragons.
Grow Scented Climbers
Plant shrubs like lilac, or train honeysuckle and climbing roses against walls to bring fragrance to nose level. Ideally, choose south or west-facing walls and they will produce their scent for even longer each day. Try the cream-flowered honeysuckle (Lonicera fragrantissima), which grows as high as 2m, or the very fragrant version ‘Winter Beauty’ (Lonicera x purpusii), which grows to 1.5m. For a rose arch, choose varieties of ramblers and climbers with a long-flowering season and few thorns, such as ‘Zéphirine Drouhin”. ‘The Pilgrim’ rose has the exotic scent of myrhh. Match it with the sumptuous, fruity fragrance of the ‘Evelyn’ rose.
Perfume the night air
Some plants are at their most fragrant in the evening. Our favourites are the tobacco plant (Nicotiana alata), sweet rocket (Hesperis matronalis), evening primrose and night-scented stock (Matthiola bicornis) , which releases a powerful fragrance at night and can be detected some distance away. Plant them where you’ll be entertaining outdoors, or outside a window. To add extra colour, plant alongside Virginian stock or honey-scented, sweet alyssum.
Pick mood-enhancing scents for seating areas
Some scents are said to improve your mood, so put these plants near where you sit or entertain.
o To invigorate, put in citrus-scented plants like lemon balm and lemon-scented thyme. To refresh, choose rosemary.
o For well-being, plant golden marjoram, geraniums and pineapple-scented sage.
o To promote happiness, choose the tobacco plant and exotic angels’ trumpets (Brugmansia), both of which share a perfume that is almost dizzying. Night-scented stock (Matthiola bicoprnis) and the four o’clock flower Mirabilis jalapa) are ideal too.
o Create a relaxing corner with a collection of lavender and sweet peas.
o Children will love chocolate cosmos – it smells of what the name suggests!
