Meadow gardens and perennial borders

The difference between meadows and perennial borders is, perhaps, a matter of scale, with the mix of plants a key to their look and feel.  Perennial borders can look quite meadow-like, at least in our vision of them,  while our 'front meadows' are probably more like exuberant perennial beds than true meadows, which include many grasses.

But I think the key is the mix of flowering perennials, whether they have large showy flowers or the reduced flowers of grasses;  this mix determines how the border/meadow feels and looks (in the garden).  A cottage garden is largely flowering perennials without grasses; a meadow includes a majority of grasses as the matrix.

Front 'meadow' in Asheville
But a sparser front planting bed, in the process of becoming more complex, feels like a meadow in progress, too.

Comments

  1. Scale~that is the issue for most of us~I have a small space (The Susans Border) planted with some larger then life plants~Silphium perfoliatum and Vernonia altissima that may cause raised eyebrows among garden designers;) I like your meadow in process and the cute cottage! gail

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