• ASTRANTIA MAJOR – grows anywhere, is good as a cut flower and is great in any border.
• ERIGERON ‘Profusion’ – the name says it all, it provides a non-stop display of small daisy flowers.
• ANEMONE x hybrida ‘Honorine Jobert’ – enjoy a late season burst of colour from the tall, white flowers.
• CATMINT (Nepeta) a perennial producing a profusion of usually lavender-blue flowers over a long season from late-spring to late-summer.
• PHLOX is a low-growing species that works excellently as a ground cover. It spreads slowly, growing in mounds that get 4–6 inches thick.
• ROSES: have upright, arching, scrambling or trailing, usually prickly stems. Their leaves are glossy and mid to dark green but occasionally grey-green. Flowers vary in shape and include flat, cupped, rounded, urn-shaped, button-eye, pompon and rosette.
• LAVENDER: are easy to grow and associate well with other shrubs, perennial plants and roses.
• FOXGLOVES (Digitalis purpurea) but be careful – it is highly poisonous and a ingestion of any parts of the plant can result in nausea, headaches and diarrhoea, or even heart and kidney problems.
• AQUILEGIA - clump-forming herbaceous perennial is easy to grow. Grow in part shade in well-drained soil; combine beautifully with hardy geraniums and will freely self-seed.
• DIANTHUS: drought tolerant and will thrive in sun or part sun in well-drained soil.
• ALCHEMILLA MOLLIS:  An indispensable foliage ground cover for fringing paths, scrambling over slopes, underplanting roses or growing in gravel. The plants produce sprays of tiny flowers and have rounded, velvety soft olive-green leaves, which catch and hold water drops making them sparkle in the sun in early summer. Grows in any soil in sun or part shade. Trim back from late summer.
• HOLLYHOCKS: Perfect for the back of a border, they grow up to 2m in height. Each stem bears masses of open, bee-friendly flowers measuring up to 10cm in diameter, from July to September.
• DELPHINIUMS: Also known as larkspur, delphiniums are traditionally a cottage garden staple, bringing height and colour to borders. The flowers are also loved by bees and are great for cutting.
• CAMPANULA: drought tolerant once established and self-seed readily.  Favourite for bees and butterflies
• PEONY: herbaceous perennials - pest resistant and drought tolerant once established.
• GERANIUM: Geranium [also known as cranesbills) and pelargoniums divide into two groups: many types of geranium are hardy, and pelargoniums are half-hardy.
• DAISY: belonging to the aster family (Asteraceae).

​

• Cottage Garden HERBS include bay, angelica, lavender, fennel, rosemary, chives and sage.

So it seems that if you’re in the know and part of the gardening fraternity, William Robinson is known as the ‘Father of the English Flower Garden’.  So – now we’re in the know!
​
A potted history (see what I did there!) of William Robinson:

• 1838:  William Robinson was born in Ireland and as a young man studied horticulture at the National Botanic Gardens at Glasnevin near Dublin.
• 1861:  moved to London and spent some time working in Regent’s Park.
• 1867: visited France which inspired him to write his first gardening book, ‘Gleanings from French Gardens’ (1868), criticising the formal nature of French gardens but praised the natural style of the ‘sub-tropical’ bedding. 
• 1870’s:  Robinson had an aversion to strait-laced garden design and was influenced by the Arts & Crafts movement, as pioneered by John Ruskin and William Morris.  The latter reacted against poor design and mass production as a result of the Industrial Revolution, and instead focused upon the revitalisation of traditional English handicrafts.
• 1870:  Robinson published two works, “Alpine Flowers for Gardens’ and ‘The Wild Garden’.
• o   Alpine Flowers for Gardens’ proposed planting species of alpine in small rock gardens, a practise which quickly caught on, becoming commonplace in many English gardens.
• o   ‘The Wild Garden’ encouraged the natural development of and respect for plant form, colour, growing habits and foliage rather than adhere strictly to a layout.  Advocating permanent planting rather than bedding plants and developing an informal garden by mixing native and exotic plants, swathes of bulbs in grass and use of colour was key in changing the focus to the English cottage garden that is the ideal for many today – 150 years later.
• 1871:  launched “The Garden” – a weekly journal and therefore reaching a wider audience with his naturalistic approach to gardening.
• 1880’s:  Through common interests and ideals he became friends with Gertrude Jekyll (1843-1932) another hugely influential gardener introducing the idea of informality and naturalness as opposed to rigid bedding schemes as seen in large Victorian formal gardens.  Cottage garden style is about cramming in as much planting as possible.

Robinson’s greatest written work ‘The English Flower Garden’ was published in 1883 and is still available today (I think I ordered a second-hand copy the other evening). He encouraged individuality and imagination, and the studying the interaction of plants, “how each one’s size, shape and foliage worked with the other to create a private, personal wilderness”.

Robinson became a most influential and respected gardener and horticultural writer, and the best example of his taste can be seen at his own garden at Gravetye Manor in Sussex.