You’ll be surprised at what you can do with just a few clippings and a bit of imagination
We could all use a little botanical pick - me - up in the depth of winter , but as gardeners , it feels like we ’re cheat when we buy a bouquet of flowers from the supermarket . Take a minuscule stroll , rather , through your garden — even if it ’s covered with Baron Snow of Leicester — and unfold your eyes to fabric you have at hired hand that you could use to create an arrangement . Search for lingering perennial foliage , intrigue seed heads , sculptural branches , bough of evergreens — both goad and broad - leaved — and vivid berries and rose hips . You ’ll be surprised at what you’re able to do with just a few snip and a minute of imagination .
Bare branches take an organisation to new heights
In the top photo , white pine boughs ( Pinus strobus , Zones 4–9 ) , broad - allow salvia ( Salvia officinaliscv . , Zones 5–8 ) , fuzzy lamb ’ ears foliage ( Stachys byzantinacv . , Zones 4–8 ) , sedum seed heads ( Sedumcv . , geographical zone 3–11 ) , and dried hydrangea blossoms ( Hydrangea paniculatacv . , zona 4–8 ) mix for a soft , tangible bouquet , while a dyad of bare pine branches with attached pinecones pop the question a zing of contrast .
Fruits and berries keep winter rattling
Below , crabapple ( Maluscvs . , USDA Hardiness Zones 3–9 ) are neat for tally a piece of rosy red to winter system , but blue viburnum berry ( Viburnum dentatumcv . , zone 3–8 ) offer an unexpected colour for the season . Here , evergreen Christmas fern ( Polystichum acrostichoides , Zones 3–8 ) and raetam ( Juniperuscv . , Zones 2–9 ) fill in with green , while golden chamaecyparis ( Chamaecyparis pisiferacv . , Zones 4–8 ) tote up a dash of yellow .
Photos : Brittany Carlson
Rose hips and fern frond relieve the green . The biggest challenge of make a pleasing winter arrangement is finding colored cloth to crack up a collection of evergreens . In this combo , red rose hips ( Rosaspp . and cvs . , Zones 2–11 ) , branches of crabapples , and the dark brown fertile frond of an ostrich fern ( Matteuccia struthiopteris , Zones 2–8 ) do the trick .
purge your kitchen and craft hoard , too . Do n’t block off at the garden when take in materials for wintertime system . Once you ’re indoors , wait around for things to tuck into the greenery , like winter mash from the kitchen or leftover feather from a craft labor . They ’ll tot that picayune something supererogatory to dress things up a bit .
Borrow from the recurrent garden . Bugleweed ( Ajuga reptans * cvs . , Zones 3–9 ) is a vigorous broadcaster in many gardens , and some of the raw cultivars have gorgeous crinkled Burgundy wine or tricolored foliage . Take advantage of an superabundance of this and other ground covers by digging a fleck up , wash the dirt off the theme , and tuck them into an arrangement .
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