prairie gardens at rhs wisley

To Kent to visit Sissinghurst and the National Orchard at Brogdale.

On our way home spent a rewarding day at Wisley - or gardener's heaven as it seemed to me!!! There is so much for gardeners to see at Wisley - our focus was on perennials used in the style that is sometimes called 'Prairie Gardening'.


The great thing about Wisley is that they make use of such interesting plants - certainly ones we don't currently use. On the left see the phlomis seed heads in the foreground. Expect to see them in a garden being developed in Nottinghamshire over the coming years!

The second picture shows how massed planting of things like the lovely sedum spectabile in the foreground can have such an impact. The use of grasses gives a distinctive character to the planting scheme.

It's almost the antithesis of everything my dad wants in a garden!

I love the loose informality of this planting style and can see it working brilliantly in bringing together the more formal gardens around the new bungalow and the 'wild' meadow and woodland habitats we expect to establish. 

Beyond the obvious aesthetic advantages, Prairie gardening is low maintenance and  is wonderful for invertebrates.

The challenge for us is to propagate enough plants!