My bed needed a little something extra as a finishing touch. I decided on a focal point that would put the final exclamation point on my color scheme.
The ceramic planter pictured above is a great choice for any color scheme featuring blue. It's an impressive piece, standing at about 3 feet tall. But what to plant in it? I decided to look for a trailing plant with golden foliage -- something that would cascade over the blue piece and stand out against it. A type of moneywort turned out to be the answer.
Golden moneywort (Lysimachia nummularia 'Aurea'), is listed as a partial sun / full shade plant. My planting bed is in full sun. But since I'm growing this "creeping jenny" in a container, I can always pick it up and move it into the shade for a spell, if necessary. Besides, landscaping in New England, I've never known moneywort to be all that fussy about such matters.
As you can see from the photo above, the moneywort is not planted directly in the heavy ceramic planter but in a smaller plastic container, which, in turn, I have wedged into the ceramic planter. The plastic container is much easier to move than the latter! Even if the moneywort tolerates the full sun and doesn't need to be moved, I may wish to swap it out for another specimen later in the summer -- just for a different look.
This focal point stands in the back row, at the northern edge of the planting bed, in between the two euonymus shrubs, where it won't cast excessive shade on any of my plants.
Need more ideas for your flower beds? In a companion piece to this article, I offer resources that will help you make sound decisions regarding the color, form and texture of your plant selections, as well as how to arrange them in a way most pleasing to the eye. You can access this resource by clicking on the "Landscape Design Ideas" link below:
