CHAPTER IX 

 Helpful Hints on Colour 



INEXPERIENCED gardeners are often in doubt how to arrange 

 the plants in borders so as to introduce all the bright colour: 

 into a limited space without creating a garish effect. Of course 

 it can always be successfully achieved by planting large masses 

 of foliage subjects or white bloomers between the others, but foi 

 this there is not always room. The accompanying figures sugges 

 how a harmony can be gained without any waste of ground. 



Cream, lemon, and gold have a wonderful power of soften- 

 ing violent contrasts, a fact which Japanese garden artists know 

 and make fine use of. In Fig. 1 royal blue, which is the colour 

 of the Cornflower, Gentian, and bedding Lobelia, also of the 

 stately Delphinium, is the centre mass of a border, while the 

 antagonistic shades of lavender and violet are led up to by inter- 

 mediate hues. By lilac is meant the tint of the old-fashioned Swee 

 Rocket, or of many a Michaelmas Daisy. When this is separated 

 by cream and gold from royal blue, the appearance is soft anc 

 pleasing. Pink is the natural outcome of lilac ; this deepens into 

 carmine, and wherever carmine looks well lavender and violet can 

 follow. On the other side of the border royal blue is judiciously 

 separated from azure blue, with which it generally clashes, anc 

 by use of terra-cotta, the hue of many bronze red Chrysanthemums 

 blush or pale pink becomes possible. 



Scarlet is difficult to place, because so many flowers are 

 pink, carmine, mauve, or 'purple; but with plenty of cream, yellow, 

 orange, or flesh it is always pleasing, and the shades of blue and 

 violet, or indigo purple, are well shown off by it. In one end of 

 the border shown in Fig. 2 royal blue and scarlet are actually 

 juxtaposed, but if the bronze foliage, the cream, and the gold are 

 placed also as marked there will be no crude effect. Rodger's 

 Bronze Leaf, or Rodgersia podophylla, is one of the loveliest and 

 most useful of hardy perennials, and will thrive at the back of 



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