How to plant a cottage garden?

[Flatbread]

Have any of you created a country/cottage garden?

How long did it take for the garden to bloom? How much work was it? How much did it cost per sq m?

We want to create a country garden facing West and a rock garden on a steep slope on the South side.

At the moment we spend summer fighting the brambles and cutting the grass that grows tall overnight. I guess the rocky soil is very fertile, so want to put it to better use. And want some kind of silvery/colourful groundcover that smothers the brambles and is low maintenance.

Have no idea how to start...any tips? Thanks!

I took a walk around Kew Gardens' cottage garden bit a few years ago and wrote down anything that caught my eye. This is my list from end of April 2010:

Lunaria rediviva
Pulmonaria mollisol & rubra
Heuchera villosa
Ranunculus
Aethionema
Allium roseum
Cornus nuttulli

Not sure if it's any help but it was just sitting there on my phone.

Oh and I think it's penstamonds not pestamons!

Avoid a popular cottage garden plant with large, hairy levels and stems and pretty little blue flowers. The name begins with a 'B' (sorry I forget it). The bloody stuff has spread everywhere now and it is a skin irritant as well as looking pretty yuk once the flowers have finished.

I bought a fabulous herb book because everything in a cottage garden should be useful right? Either for eating, medicine or, at a push, selling (cut flowers usually). I will look it up. It's wonderful.

Do you mean borage, Celine? What you're describing, though, sounds more like alkanet. People often get then confused as they look quite alike, although borage has prettier, drooping flowers (alkanet's are more like large forget-me-nots) and has the further benefit of being used in Pimms.

I know all thus because when I first planted my garden, my well-meaning mother gave me a clump of alkanet, telling me it was borage, and it took me a very long time to get rid if it and all its seedlings. Thank you, mother.

Funny, some lovely gardens on that site! Also looking at various photos of paths and seating.

Celine, thanks. You are soooo much more organised than me! I write the names of plants I like on the back of an envelope and then lose these after a few days

Good to know what doesn't work. And what is invasive. For example, I thought rhododendrons were a possibility in the rock garden, but have been reading how invasive they are.

So would be super helpful to know what not to plant!

You're right Maud. I've just looked it up it's Pentaglottis sempervirens aka alkanet and I too was told it was borage! It's a nightmare. I took a blowtorch to the nasty grey stems one autumn. It worked a treat but I do worry about burning other plants and we're under a flight path so I try to avoid burning things.

Herb book is by Gertrude Jekyll.

Oh, and I've done nothing with that list since I put it in my phone!

Other plants to try: Stocks (annual - buy plug plants for an instant lift) and foxgloves of course. Unless you are worried about things eating them.

Dont plant valerian. It is pretty but seeds everywhere and the roots go very deep and creep into the spaces in walls.
Mint in a pot not in the ground
Grasses: I have a grass (spider plant which has done very well ie is now ginormous) and whilst providing structure and architecture it, too, spreads -easy to control though. But I like the grasses which make sounds in the gentlest of wind - as if one is on a Yorkshire moor, but is in fact in the middle of an urban garden. They are evergreen so good to have around.

I'm thinking of going to this, weather and budget and family permitting
www.greatdixter.co.uk/whats-on/events/winter-opening-weekend/

I created a new rock garden very cheaply last year.

I had a large conifer removed from the back of the garden. It was huge and been there for around 50 years. The soil left was in a pretty bad way but it looked to bear to just leave and the soil was to poor to plant any shrubs.

i removed the top layer of soil and added fresh topsoil mixed with compost and some garden grit and added some large rocks. Around the rocks i planted iris bulbs in purple and yellow bought from poundland for a pound a pack. I then scattered one of those boxes of seeds, cost £1.99 for a mix of cottage garden seeds mix, gave it a gentle rake then covered the whole lot with a large sheet of plastic. ( i used an old decorating sheet i had knocking about in the garage but new they are only a couple of pound). The sheet stopped the birds from eating the seed and i removed it once i had a inch or so of growth.

By the summer i had a 3 metre bed packed full of colour. I had Cornflowers
poppies,Old english marigolds, Calafornia poppies, Aster, Campanula and of course the irises.
All for under a tenner.

The dixter house garden (in funny's link) looks lovely! Does anyone know what the gorgeous yellow plants are?

Cantspel, I like your idea of covering the seeds and bulbs. I have a sneaking suspicion our young pup digs up the bulbs when our backs our turned. I suspect he thinks they are small balls to play with. I think he is the culprit for the bulbs not spouting not because I planted them upside down

The weekend at Great Dixter sounds lovely. I am currently trying to persuade DH that we should go.

::Bats eyelashes at DH::

Gosh I'm an idiot today. Gertrude Jekyll??! Jekka McVicar book here

Geranium 'Rozanne' is a great long season flowerer also. Buy and plant in threes.

Flatbread - Did you mean the yellow plant on the Gt Dixter homepage? I think it's verbascum olympicum.

Maud, that's the one, I think. Thanks. It is also on the cover of Hamilton's Cottage Gardens. (book arrived yesterday, yay!)

Cuttedup, thanks, will add that to my list.

A bit of a setback, Parker's doesn't deliver to the Channel islands. And nor does it seem any of the other nurseries I contacted.

So will have to stick with the one I found on the island, but it is limited in plant varieties...