The article in NYTimes yesterday about Absinthe, with all the descriptions of its color from pale celadon and shimmering aquamarine to extra virgin olive oil to dizzyingly garish shades that don’t exist in nature had me thinking on the subject of green foliage, in particular of course that other color also named after a French liqeur, Chartreuse. Because its on my mind.
These images are actually from June last year at the Wave Hill flower garden. There is a section where the borders are all shades of green. The photos were taken in early June which is pertinent only because it's actually a great way to approach May when there's more foliage than flower - having an interesting visual assortment of foliage like this is a great start.
In the right image, there's an interesting contrast in size and texture, the large leaves in the rear contrasting with the finer branched foliage in the front. I don't love large leaved chartreuse foliage though- it just seems too much in the space I'm working with. In the photo on the left, the color really stands out, contrasting sharply from the other plants, except I already have something really similar going on with the Spirea and the Cypress.
I'm thinking aloud because I have to find a couple of chartreuse-ish plants for this summer and this is making me analyze the choices. I do however really like that Caryopteris. It's Worcester Gold but I know from reading Hayefield, Nan Ondra's blog that the one I really really want is Sunshine Blue which is similar, retains more of it's yellow color, flowers later and with richer purple-blue flowers. Her blog is probably the best, certainly the most interesting source of information about foliage color, her current post is all about Yellow. Another plant I liked at wave Hill was the Ornamental Comfrey. So many choices, so little time.
+ OGMedia:Tomato Seedlings
+ OccasionalOasis:Sansula
