The Garden on Chalk Lane

Today 😎

Edging towards Autumn 🍃🍂🍃

Slightly earwig-nibbled but the *most* sublime colouring coming through on this round of Café au Lait Dahlias.

This year my tuber grown blooms have more of a pinky edge than the rooted cuttings.

The wild and tangly last days of summer…

Daucus (Wild Carrot) currently
taller than me and still growing

Sublime Agapanthus looking jubilant today, in spite of the imminent rain 🌧

Here come the Strawflowers...
All 300 of them (!)

These will be cut, wrapped in brown paper and hung to dry in a dark cool barn. If dried carefully, Strawflowers retain their shape, colour and lovely papery texture so can be enjoyed all over again.

Shady canopy

Novia Carnation

The loveliest peachy-parchment colouring and the closest match I have found to Café au Lait Dahlias (which are currently coming into bud here....)

This is my first attempt at growing these beauties and I am absolutely in love with them.

Drifts of Tanacetum Parthenium and a magical Weeping Willow.

Tanacetum is an ancient cottage garden annual with fragrant, ferny foliage and large showy sprays of little white flowers.

Beautiful AND medicinal, Tanacetum leaves have been used for centuries as a natural cure for migraines💊

🌈 today

🌱Yesterday’s lunchtime view at Daylesford

Still no sign of summer, but these roses don’t seem to mind all the recent rain...

🌾Inspiring me today...this installation of suspended and pinned tumblew**d.

Throughout the 1950s and into the early 1960s, the Eames Office designed and installed the interiors and furniture groupings for Herman Miller’s Los Angeles showroom (the building was also an Eames design.

The Eameses reorganized and enlivened the spaces with an eclectic selection of objects from toys, plants, and tumble w**d to sculptures, folk art, and photo murals.

Poppies

High Summer scent...
Roses, Jasmin and Honeysuckle

Digitalis ‘Ruby Glow’

So much love for these Foxgloves...

Unlike the typically pastel-coloured varieties, this version is wonderfully vibrant!

‘Eyes For You’ rose...isn’t it incredible? Looks more like a Poppy than a rose, with that sublime ombre plummy-pink middle. Backed up by Salvia ‘Love and Wishes’

My kinda power couple!

Dead Nettle looks convincingly like a true stinging nettle, the leaves are jagged and they reach upwards amongst genuine nettles.

It is thought Dead Nettles evolved to look like true nettles to avoid predators. The main difference aside from no sting, is the intricately formed flowers; teeny little hooded velvety blooms.

A new discovery for me and a new favourite as they are lovely as medium height bedding plants and last at least a week as unusual delicate cut flower stems

Today...

More of the stripe✌️

This time it’s rosa ‘Bright Ideas’

Sweet little Rosa Canina adorning this hedgerow

Peony perfection today 🏆

Poppies...short lived but utterly exquisite while they last....

Late June marks that magical sweet-spot when every corner of the garden has something beautiful to share

Raspberry Ripple (Variegata di Bologna) Roses blooming away beautifully today....

This incredible Bourbon shrub rose has distinctive, pinky-purple stripes and divine heady fragrance.

Introduced in 1909, it is now a relatively rarely grown variety.

Striped roses were at their most fashionable in the late 1800s and early years of the last century.

I think they are spectacular and I’m determined to bring appreciation for stripey back....who’s with me for a revival?

Ombré roses

Today

And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul

John Muir

Forest bathing, surrounded by drifts of magical frothy umbellifers 🙏

“I must have flowers, always and always....”

Claude Money

Peeking Peonies

Iris

Roses and Lilac

Peony

‘Bowl of Cream’

I have SO been looking forwards to these sumptuous blooms

I conditioned and then moved the stems in and out of cool/warm spots to synchronise their opening over the last few days and it has been well worth the wait

The dark velvety raspberry rose is Capability (Ausapply) and has a spicy, rich heady perfume

The plush peachy-orange rose is Juliet (Ausjameson) and is one of my total favourites

Just in shot are the vintage pink petals of Keira (Ausboxer) which is another densely packed rose head with sweet ruffled petal edges and deeper pink center