Hellebore garden hybrids at Willowhill Garden
by Eric Wright and Sally Lorimore, Garden Owners
One of our key garden design features is to have as much colour over as many months in the year as possible. Plant varieties that produce a colourful winter/early spring display are limited but the sheer range of hellebore garden hybrids provide the potential for an exceptionally fine display in the garden when not much else is out. Their flowering time is extensive; they emerge with snowdrops, continue flowering with most forms of daffodils and overlap with early and mid-season tulips too. And still, they keep going, the fading flower colour assumes an attractive pinky, smoky purple or green shade as seed heads mature.
Hellebore garden hybrids produce a large quantity of flowering stems; the flowers are large and with such a wide range of lovely colours from black/slate shades through purples and pinks to whites, green and pale yellows to choose from it is possible to plant a very colourful winter/early spring garden. The beautiful flower colour is enhanced with variations in veining, spotting and colouring of the nectaries.
Hellebores have been incorporated into our garden design largely depending on whether the plant has downward or outward facing blooms; outward facing forms are often planted to the back of borders, downwards to the front where the intricate flower patterns can be more easily seen by lifting the flower. For downward facing flowers we were looking to plant hellebores in drifts in flower borders to produce a mass of winter colour without taking up too much space at the border front to allow for summer plantings. One border was designed for the border front to be different in summer and winter. We dug a ‘D’ shaped border with grass paths around with the curved side designed for summer plantings and the back of the border (the straight of the D) planted with deciduous shrubs. Underplanting these shrubs with drifts of over 50 hellebore hybrids in different colours and markings creates a front of border effect over the winter. From a distance, the border is a mass of colour and close-up, the exquisite detail of the downward facing flowers can be examined.
It would be fair to say that hellebore hybrids have become our winter obsession over the last 10 years. Commercial breeding programmes have produced many fine new forms but our favourites are the Helleborus x hybridus Ashwood Garden Hybrids ‘Evolution Group’. The main attraction for us is the large outward facing blooms on strong stems which hold their heads up for all to see the wonderful flower colour and detail even at the back of a 20ft deep border. We particularly like the excellent ‘sunset’, ‘yellow’ and ‘neon’ forms that stand out well against the dark earth in early season.
Another key feature of Willowhill garden design, plantings and maintenance is that the garden should be wildlife friendly and be attractive to invertebrates. Where there are considerable numbers and diversity of invertebrates, birds, mammals and amphibians will follow. Hellebores are an important source of pollen and nectar when other food sources are limited in late winter/early spring and are very popular with hungry queen bumblebees post-hibernation.
Hellebores can be expensive as breeding programmes take considerable expertise and growing to flowering size is time consuming; however, the plants last for years and are very generous with their seed. We have slowly accumulated plants, initially as gifts on birthdays or at Christmas, but now have a diverse collection of over two hundred garden hybrids from initial purchases (Ashwood Nursery forms do very well here) and plants derived from seedlings of these purchases.
Seedlings have produced some lovely new plants with many flower colours similar to our original purchases. Other seedlings produce plants with flower colour quite different to our initial purchases and each winter we look forward to seeing what new flower variations will emerge. Some of these young plants are potted on and are popular purchases at our garden openings for Scotland’s Garden Scheme. Also available for sale at our garden opening in March will be a limited number of the fabulous Helleborus x hybridus Ashwood Garden Hybrids ‘Evolution Group’ yellow and neon forms.
Willowhill are taking part in the new Hellebore Festival, a wonderful opportunity to visit the garden and view the beautiful hellebore collection, find out more below.
