Europe

A Great Plant Pick, and rightly so because this performs in the garden. Thin spikes of soft pink flowers are held nicely upright, more so than many other cultivars and pair wonderfully with the bold green foliage to create a ethereal pinkish floral haze above the bulwark of green. Not weedy or aggressive, this is good.

Dog Tooth Violet. There are no bad Erythroniums and this is near the top of the heap. Dark pink flowers are infused with a blue tinge giving them a wonderful lilac color and creating an easy avenue to naming this cultivar. A star in the shade garden with nice mottled foliage.

Presumably a selection by rock garden pioneer H. Lincoln Foster. Tight rosettes of silver-encrusted leaves are complemented by tall sprays of deep red flowers in spring. Thrives in the rock garden, containers, or other sunny areas with excellent drainage. Classic choice for tufa planting should you be so lucky.

Lavender flowered version of the typically blue-flowered European species. Thanks to our friend and Hepatica guru John Massey of Ashwood Nurseries for sharing seed. We have flowered these plants and they are indeed lavender! Perfect in the woodland garden, very hardy and with impeccable provenance.

A selection of this outstanding European alpine species notable for having large flowers and being quite a good bloomer. Not all acaulis flower freely but 'Krebs' brings it with large upward-facing trumpets of impossible blue except they are right there in front of you so it must be possible but how can such a tight mat of small green adpressed leaves produce such a fantastical display of color intensity? The good thing is we don't have to know how and why about everything and sometimes it is quite enough to have your senses left reeling by a wee bit of green that does something so flamboyant that it would leave Sir Richard Branson shaking his head in rueful acknowledgment at having been thoroughly bested. We were so excited to finally get this clone that we told all of our friends we got 'Krebs' and it was a long time before we noticed no one was coming over or inviting us to dinner. Our friends aren't plant people for the most part so the misinterpretation was understandable and most have come back once we explained but we really miss Rich and Karen.

White flowered version of the typically blue-flowered European species. Thanks to our friend and Hepatica guru John Massey of Ashwood Nurseries for sharing seed. We have flowered these plants and they are indeed white! Perfect in the woodland garden, very hardy and with impeccable provenance.

Wolfsbane. Our collection from the Swiss Alps of this quietly charming yellow-flowered Aconitum Lovely at trail's edge in the light shade of the deciduous forest in August. Apparently this is key to any good witches garden and used in shapeshifting spells and as a werewolf repellant. Better safe than sorry.

Purple flowered version of the typically blue-flowered European species. Thanks to our friend and Hepatica guru John Massey of Ashwood Nurseries for sharing seed. We have flowered these plants and they are indeed purple! Perfect in the woodland garden, very hardy and with impeccable provenance.

Surely one of the best Omphalodes with electric blue flowers nearly twice the size of the species. This was shared with us by our plant guru John Flintoff who has given us so many treasures over the years. A vigorous and not fussy coarse foliaged groundcover perfect under Rhododendrons and one that is easy to keep in bounds. Those blue Forget-me-not flowers somehow just seems to feel like an integral part of spring for us.

Double Flowered Solomon's Seal. Hard to come by and desirable double form of this excellent garden plant. The extra petals looks like a little green rose when you lift one of the dangling white bells and peer inside. It is one of those little surprises that makes the garden so fun.

Little gem of a Stachys we brought back from Scotland in 2013 although we hate parting with any, to be honest. Super compact with tight rich green rugose leaves and short spikes of snow white flowers of a purity and innocence so unsullied that felt compelled to ask permission prior to dividing. Perfect rock garden plant.

This widespread little fern is of Scottish provenance where it is abundant and easily found in rock cracks and sundry centuries-old architectural features such as stone walls, stone bridges, stone follies and stone buildings that combine to make villages and gardens so damned picturesque especially when covered in ferns. The spores are covered by a bubble-like indusium which inspired the common name of Bladder Fern.

We love white flowers in the shade garden. The juxtaposition against the dark earth and the interplay and mediation with other colors makes white an excellent choice. These have pure white flowers with a light chartreuse throat touched faintly in red and of course those perfectly mottled leaves.

A European Trillium relative that forms small colonies in time by creeping rhizomes. Four-parted leaves and greenish flowers that look like an artistic, sculptural rendition influenced by recreational doses of psilocybin. These later give way to a black knob of seeds which are attractive in their own right. Our patch in our shade garden has increased to about 4' across and once it hits 10', we will feel like we have enough.

Pink Willow Gentian. Thanks to Claire Cockroft for sharing these with us so we can pass them along to you. Choice and scarce pink form of one of the classic fall blooming gentians, this develops into a robust plant with many arching stems ranked with pink flowers. An easy wow.

Rarely offered little Wormwood which is troughable, which is a term we should trademark in order to capitalize on the 20 or so people who have both troughs and a penchant for dwarf Artemisia. We need a new business advisor or maybe we should listen to the current one. Few inches high and spreading. Yellowish flowers.

Classic name for what must be an English selection with amber tawny yellow flowers - in the US with our bright yellow squeeze bottle mustard, it would have to be an old forgotten bottle of mustard indeed. Easy doer we got from that consummate English plantsman David Mason and he didn't steer us wrong. Wide leaves backing stems with umbels of pub mustard flowers with a white eye.

Crested Hart's Tongue Fern. Crested ferns are always fun and this one does provide some amusement in the garden. Rather than the typical evergreen, entire sword-shaped leaves which taper to a point, these crested forms splay out at the end into a rounded and ruffled flourish which might mark this as a self-indulgent dandy were it not for its complete absence of ego. More than happy to play a necessary supporting role to those blooming Trilliums for example. Doesn't mind a bit of lime and will self-spore in mortared walls.

Rock Soapwort. This is a lovely and tough rock garden or crevice plant from the Pyrenees where it grows in exposed sheer rock faces. Dense cushions of close-packed rosettes with narrow short green leaves. Pink-purple flowers are held on short 2" stems in groups of one to three. One becomes a group when hanging with the Threes. Full sun, good drainage, zones 3-8.

Uncommon and choice dwarf Thyme we introduced to the US when we brought this little gem home from an alpine nursery in Scotland. A very fine plant of compact habit and the expected profusion of flowers which while not red, are a vividly intense neon fuchsia-infused magenta. Find that on a paint chip!