Our April Issue: The Scented Garden
Suggestions for a sweetly-perfumed garden, from scented blossoms to foliage
that releases scent when touched.

Lavandula x intermedia 'Provence'

The Magic of Fragrance
You've got color. You've got texture. Now get the ultimate in garden enjoyment with fragrance! One of the best things about walking through a lovely garden is the wonderful scents that can tempt, delight and surprise you. It's easy to add fragrance to your landscape by filling it with perennials, ground covers and shrubs that release scents from their flowers and foliage. A scented garden will also attract a host of pollinators: bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.

6 Easy Tips for a Fragrant Garden

Agastache Rupestris, Licorice Mint

Scentillating Xeriscape Perennials
Many plants have distinctive fragrances, but it is the subtle mingling of scents from a variety of plants that will tempt your senses. Essentail aromatic companions, Agastache and Lavender are sun-loving favorites that prefer ‘lean,' well-drained soils. Another plant that grows well in 'lean' soil, Snowflake Garden Pink forms a multitude snowflake-shaped flowers that perfume your garden with their intense fragrance. The sweetly fragrant blossoms of the Berlandiera lyrata really do smell like chocolate!

Visit ‘Texas Violet' on a still morning and you'll catch the light scent of grape in the air. For the warm scent of sage, plant Salvia officinalis 'Minima'. Santolina rosmarinifolius 'Morning Mist' is a wonderful, pleasantly pungent Lavender Cotton. Plant the deep blue and pink flowered Hyssop fragrant herb and the lavender-blue Iris pallida 'Variegata' for romantic color and scent.

View all of our Fragrant Xeriscape Perennials

Zeric Aroma Garden

The Xeric Aroma Garden
Planting for a summer-long explosion of fragrances is easy, even for beginner gardeners. The Xeric Aroma Garden designed by Scott and Lauren Springer Ogden exclusively for High Country Gardens brings together the pleasures of scent and color into a single space. By using a combination of fragrant flowers and aromatic plants (that release their pleasing scents when touched or brushed) their design will grow to create a living potpourri.


Deliciously Scented Hardy Perennials

Echinacea pupurea 'Fragrant Angel'

For compost enriched soils, Echinacea pupurea 'Fragrant Angel' will add drama to your garden's mix with its huge, fragrant white flowered, golden-coned flowers. The light orange with a rose Echinacea x Big Sky™ Summer Sky is reported to be the most delightfully fragrant of the Echinacea and is recommended as a long lasting cut flower. The deliciously fragrant Phlox paniculata 'David' and Phlox paniculata 'Laura' are a "must have" in your flower beds.

View our Fragrant Hardy Perennials

Lemon Bush Thyme

It's Thyme for Groundcovers
Seek out both fragrant perennials and groundcovers if you want a season-long display of color as well as fragrance. Thyme is a fragrant, flowering herb that spreads easily, but not invasively. Because of its drought tolerance and long-lasting color, Thyme is becoming a popular lawn replacement plant and is a great ground cover choice for fragrant gardens.

View these Fragrant Thyme Groundcovers

Rosa eglanteria

Orange, Rose, and Cloves
Have you ever taken a whiff of of Mock Orange? Philadelphus lewisii, Lewis Mock Orange is so intoxicating that you will want it to trail into your open summer windows and surround your lounging outdoor areas. Consider planting the most poetic of shrubs, the shrub rose -- a favorite flower of poets since poetry began, and the perfect backdrop to your fragrant garden. Here, the pink Rosa eglanteria Sweet Briar Rose as indulged by Shakespear:

know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows
Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine.

You will love the huge overflowing Buddleia alternifolia, with it's scented lavender flowers. And the intensely Clove-Scented yellow spring flowers of Ribes odoratum are spicy garden favorites.

View these fragrant shrubs

Ribes odoratum 'Crandall'

Ultimately, fragrance is very personal
Locate your scented garden where you can frequently take advantage of its luxurious smells, allowing you to rejuvenate your spirit and unwind from a stressful day. Plant fragrant perennials in containers and small patio spaces, in addition to your landscape. You won't need to travel far or visit a spa for this aromatherapy. Having a private, fragrant place in your garden is good for your soul--it's a relaxing and beneficial retreat to ease the stress of the day.

In friendship's fragrant garden,
There are flowers of every hue.
Each with its own fair beauty
And its gift of joy for you.
- Friendship's Garden