Plants and pots for front of the house

[whimsicalwillow]

What do you have at the front of your houses? For the 3rd time one of the big terracotta pots outside mine had blown over and smashed. It housed a small conifer. I had one each side of porch step. My drive is tarmaced ( small car park!) with a little flowerbed at the end of the drive with shrubs in. The pots livened the area up.
What pots if any do you have? Anyone got on plastic but realistic pots? Can you give me ideas about what else besides a conifer type tree I can plant. I don't want bedding plants, rather have s shrub etc. Photo's would be brilliant! Thank you

No photos but I have some olive trees in plastic pots within wooden planters (basically square wooden plant pots). Bay tree might be a better option than conifer

Euphorbia, hebe shrubs maybe?

I have two hollies, shaped as balls, in large terracotta planters. They were expensive so I’ve put bricks inside to weight them down, stop them being blown over and anyone who thought they’d make off with them.

Bay or olive standards or Holly tree. If it's tall though it will blow over-I've had a lovely big pot of a pair smashed, no replacement available & going to build planters now out of reclaimed brick. If you get a pot that doesn't taper at the bottom it will be better too.

I have live trees, in quite large ceramic planters, there is no way they could blow over, as the soil inside weights them so much. And the planters themselves are heavy. I find terracotta surprisingly fragile. Any have had have always broken so I never buy them now.

Citrus trees provided you have somewhere to move them during the cold season. Second bay trees. I also have a largish rosemary shrub in a pot but it's taken years of constant pruning to get it dense enough to look well in a pot.

Anyone got these square grey plastic containers? Definitely not having anymore terracotta pots. They're £30 a pop and I've had 3 blow over and smash. I think our front of house is a bit of a wind tunnel but even so. I do like the miniature conifers as they're easy to maintain and look lovely at Christmas with fairy lights.

How tricky are bay trees to maintain? Quite like the idea of holly bushes. Haven't really ever noticed them at garden centres. What sort of shape are they?

Bay trees are v easy! I've bought some grey plastic pots from Lidl, they're good. I often put old polystyrene in the bottom for drainage but think heavier stones might help it not to topple

I have Bay trees too, except in large square metal planters.
They're great as you can still decorate them at Christmas and you can use then for cooking!
I put a lot of stones at the bottom for drainage and to help weigh it down.

I have two Phormiums (New Zealand flax) which are beautiful - they are in terracotta pots but the pots are huge so no chance of blowing over. I also have large pebbles covering the soil inside each pot, partly to maximise the amount of moisture retained by the soil and partly because it looks nicer.

So far the phormiums have been pretty low maintenance and tolerate full sun very well (the front of our house gets full sun from late morning onwards). My only gripe is that one has grown slightly larger than the other which irritates my desire for perfect symmetry either side of the door but both plants are thriving and healthy.

Phormiums are an option. Are they fairly hardy? I lost one after a hard winter.
Bay trees look lovely. Do you feed them or is it just a case of watering regularly ? You can tell I'm not the most knowledgeable gardener!

A cottage border at the very front of the house then apple trees and an oak tree toward the gate. We've stopped having any pots as they just need so much watering when away, etc.