A flower garden is, in Wikipedia’s definition, “any garden or part of a garden where plants that flower are grown and displayed.” The term mostly refers to herbaceous plants rather than the flowering shrubs and trees of a shrubbery or woodland garden. As a hashtag, #FlowerGarden gathers photos of beds, borders, cottage plantings and cutting gardens grown mainly for their blooms.
Origin
Gardens given over to flowers are relatively recent. Wikipedia notes that once flowers were domesticated, most were grown separately or within gardens that had another main purpose, and that in the West “the idea of parts of gardens dedicated to flowers perhaps did not become common until the 16th century.”
Two English traditions shaped the flower gardens most people picture today:
- The herbaceous border. An early reference to the term appears in The Gardener’s Magazine on 1 June 1831, according to Wikipedia, and such borders were first popularly used in gardens in the Victorian era. They are work-intensive: the perennials have to be dug up and divided every 3–4 years.
- The cottage garden. Practical cottage plots go back centuries, but their stylised reinvention, per Wikipedia, “occurred in 1870s England” as a reaction against formal estate gardens. William Robinson and Gertrude Jekyll popularised the looser style; Robinson’s The Wild Garden was published in 1870, and Jekyll’s Colour in the Flower Garden followed in 1908.
How It’s Used
Posts under the tag range from a few pots to large borders. Design is usually about timing as much as colour: because flowers bloom at different times and some plants are annuals, flower garden design “usually needs to take into consideration maintaining a sequence of bloom,” Wikipedia explains.
Pollinators are a growing theme. Wikipedia reports that more diverse plantings and larger floral displays draw more pollinator activity, and that “in general, native flowers attract more pollinators than non-native species.” The Royal Horticultural Society’s advice for the cottage look is that it needs “voluptuous planting and haphazard self-seeding.” For related styles on Hashpedia, see #CottageGarden and #Cottagecore.
Types of Flower Garden
| Type | What it is | Typical plants or features |
|---|---|---|
| Herbaceous (perennial) border | Perennials arranged closely together “to create a dramatic effect through colour, shape or large scale”; called a perennial border in North America | Soft-stemmed perennials, divided every 3–4 years |
| Cottage garden | Informal design, traditional materials, dense plantings and a mix of ornamental and edible plants | Traditionally primroses, violets, hollyhocks and sweet william; the RHS picks foxgloves, lavender, delphiniums, philadelphus and roses |
| Cutting garden | Grows flowers for indoor use rather than outdoor display, usually out of public view | Dahlias, tulips and hydrangeas as focal points |
| Wildflower bed | A seed mix of annuals, biennials and self-seeding plants so that some are always in bloom | Mixed wildflower seed |
| ”Flower garden in a box” | A pre-packaged design with separate seed packets and a layout to follow | Packaged seeds and planting plan |
The world’s longest herbaceous border, according to the Guinness Book of Records as cited by Wikipedia, is 215 metres long, at Dirleton Castle in East Lothian, Scotland.