The wildflower meadow in a Gloucestershire garden is a delicate tapestry of white Narcissus ‘Segovia’, along with oxlips and cowslips that pick up on exuberant heads of Euphorbia characias subsp. wulfenii below a Prunus x subhirtella ‘Autumnalis’.
Eva Nemeth
The contemporary approach of creating natural-look gardens helps pollinators and produces a beautiful simplicity reminiscent of the countryside. This naturalistic mood employs single-flowered and informal-looking garden plants, but, unsurprisingly, many British wildflowers (including native and introduced species) fit in effortlessly too.
Of course, some countryside favourites – rosebay willowherb, dandelions, and ox-eye daisies, for instance – are too enthusiastic to court in the average garden setting. But there is a wide range of better behaved wildflowers, from the lightweight heads of quaking grass (Briza media) that shimmer in the sun, to the shrubby Chartreuse hare’s ear (Bupleurum fruticosum), which is a current favourite with designers.
In the new rewilded garden at Knepp, native species in the mix include pasqueflower (Pulsatilla vulgaris), wild carrot (Daucus carota), and silky-spike melic (Melica ciliata), jostling and disordered as they would be on a wasteland; and in the recently revamped Delos garden at Sissinghurst, which imitates wildflowers colonising ancient ruins, Dan Pearson has included several British wildflowers, including pale flax (Linum bienne), bloody cranesbill (Geranium sanguineum), and sea stock (Matthiola sinuata). In these futuristic havens, planting is not structured and self-seeding is encouraged. This dreamy design approach leads to a kind of ordered chaos that reminds us of the countryside, allows us to cope with drought, and fills our gardens with the sight and sounds of a rich diversity of wildlife.
Which wildflowers can you grow in a garden?
The corn poppy (Papaver rhoeas)
Andrew Montgomery
Wildflowers to grow for colour
Rarely glimpsed in the wild today, the brilliant-blue cornflower (Centaurea cyanus) once peppered our cornfields with streaks of sapphire. Beautiful, non-invasive, and good for pollinators, it’s a lovely addition to the ornamental border or can be grown in rows for cutting in the kitchen garden. Another must-have blue is viper’s bugloss (Echium vulgare), which thrives on chalk downland and hums with bees when its electric-blue spires bloom in summer. Now extremely rare in the wild, meadow clary (Salvia pratensis) is a third fabulous blue that was cultivated in Elizabethan gardens and used to dot wildflower meadows with rich indigo. Combine these blue gems with vivid reds for a thrilling riot of colour. The corn poppy (Papaver rhoeas) is excellent, as is the lesser-known pheasant’s eye (Adonis annua), which is an incredible bold letterbox red.
Wildflowers to grow for scent
On still summer days, the countryside is heady with the scents of wildflowers and, since fragrance is the most emotional of the senses, they often carry a sentimentality. In Cider with Rosie, Laurie Lee recalls the scents of his childhood summers being ‘twice-sharp’, including the glorious stench of garlic woods by moonlight, and that, under the hot sun, ‘burnt sap and roast nettles tingled our nostrils’. In the garden, the Cheddar pink (Dianthus gratianopolitanus) fills the air with a powerful clove and vanilla perfume that belies its size, and the fleecy ivory plumes of dropwort (Filipendula vulgaris) smell of honey. Wild roses are perfect for naturalistic plantings and provide food for bees: eglantine (Rosa rubiginosa) boasts apple-scented leaves (Vita Sackville-West loved it so much she used it for hedging at Sissinghurst) and R. arvensis is a vigorous, dense rambler with musk-scented blooms; like eglantine, it is best grown in a mixed hedge. As dusk falls, the native flowers that lure moths begin to release their heady fragrances: sweet rocket (Hesperis matronalis), night catchfly (Silene noctiflora), and, of course, honeysuckle (Lonicera periclymenum), which grows wild in our hedgerows and woodland fringes and is so potent that a mature plant can fill a whole garden with its delicious perfume.
Wildflowers to grow to promote wildlife
Most wildflowers provide for wildlife in some way, making them superb for boosting a garden’s biodiversity. In autumn, goldfinches will fly in to take seeds from the architectural heads of teasel (Dipsacus fullonum). Moths love white campion (Silene latifolia) and wild sweet William (Saponaria officinalis), drawn to their perfume and their white flowers, which glow in the darkness. Bees adore greater wild thyme Thymus pulegioides, which can be used in cooking, and mountain cranesbill (Geranium pyrenaicum), which has an airy sprawling habit, making it ideal for growing through roses or structural perennials; while butterflies prefer wild marjoram (Origanum vulgare) and the pastel-blue pincushions of small scabious (Scabiosa columbaria), which is less thuggish than field scabious.
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