I volunteer at a community project. I'm currently in the process of creating a dead hedge boat. (The first layer is weaved willow to give the structure some strength) What blue plants could I sow/plant around it to create the feeling of the sea?
It's in dappled shade most of the day, will have kids running about round it and I have a pretty limited budget. Any ideas?
by thismustb3th3plac3
14 Comments
My first thought was just to sow lots of forget-me-knots and add in some little patches of gypsophila for foamy wave-crests but I am very jetlagged and may already be dreaming I am on the boat. Looks like a fun project!
Edit – you can also get Armeria which is whitey-blue-ish but could form nice wavey mounds. It has the added benefit of being called Sea Thrift.
I’d personally have a layer of salvia of blue / dark blue, some lavender and mountain cornflower behind it. But it’ll be high maintenance to keep in check with the cornflower. They’re all perennial too, but probably only the cornflower would hold up close to the wood from kids.
Maybe lobelia
Naturalise bluebells. No matter what you plant there the blue effect will be seasonal anyway. Bluebells can be mown over once they finish. It will be shade there once the trees get their leaves back.
Snow in the summer – Cerastium
Ceanothus- smothered in stunning blue flowers atm. Dark evergreen leaves the rest of the time.
Trailing bellflower or another mat forming plant?
For all year round blue, maybe underplant with a grass like Elijah blue.
Something like wheat or long grasses.
[Aubretia](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/03/37/fe/0337fe29ca26e429431c6f4f38ae645a.jpg) maybe? Although the colour might be too dark. The lighter colour is more purple than blue.
I’d go ornamental grasses at different heights / colours
Nigella (love in a mist); cupid’s dart. Campanula, pansies, violets (the bluer varieties).
Why are your picnic tables so far apart? It looks like a pub beer garden.
For this rime of the year, carpet bugle, forget me nots and perennial cornflower would offer a wonderful blue display, very inexpensively. Obviously it would take time to establish and spread, but it you’re patient, these will spread for free.
I speak from blue experience.