Van Dycks

If there's one refrain gardeners sing too often it's "You should have been here last week," or "You should have come next week." It seems like no matter how the garden looks, something special has always just gone out of flower, or won't bloom until after our garden visitors are gone.

This is because we have gotten keep thinking of gardens as places with flowers. But if you stripped away all the leaves think how funny those flowers would look. And how bare and possibly boring the garden would look. Take a good look at your garden. Foliage can be beautiful - sometimes even as beautiful as the flowers they ornament.

I've been obsessed with foliage for a long time - so much so that, on a dare to myself, I created one garden that consists of nothing but non-flowering plants and grasses. It is a bit more subdued than my flower gardens, perhaps, but every bit as colorful. And I never, never have to tell anyone that they should have been here last week. Once the hostas emerge and the grasses come out of their winter dormancy, this garden always looks great.

Not that I'm suggesting that you go out and do the same. After all, one wonderful thing about flowers is the wonderful fragrances they emit, and the buzz of bees and the flutter of butterflies and all manner of wonderful things that come with them. But I am suggesting that if you pay attention to the leaves as well as the flower, you can have a garden that is interesting and colorful whether things are blooming or not.

We don't often stop to think that not all leaves are green. They are also gold, chartreuse, blue, silver, and purple. And then there are the variegated leaves that can range from green and white through purple and silver, or even pink. Some plants with foliage like this, carefully placed, can add enormous interest to your garden.

You can enjoy colorful foliage even in spring. The Darwin hybrid tulip 'Silver Stream', for instance, has a lovely silvery edging that brightens things up immensely. And many of the botanical tulips have lovely red dots and dashes running throughout the foliage that make them interesting even before the blooms emerge.

And don't forget hosta. 'Sum and Substance' can make an enormous (almost 6' across!) splash in the garden, and its chartreuse-gold leaves will brighten a dark corner beautifully. So will the bright white margins on the leaves on Hosta 'Patriot' - a plant so "hot" when it was first introduced that people were willing to pay astronomical prices for it, but which has now descended to prices we mere mortals can afford. Actually, hostas come in blue (see 'Bressingham Blue' and 'Halcyon' ), green ('Grandiflora' is a must - the flowers are gorgeously fragrant!), gold, and chartreuse, as well as every imaginable combination of the above. 'Frances Williams' for instance, is downright festive with its blue leaves with a golden-yellow border, and 'Wide Brim' is more subdued but colorful with its blue-green edges with creamy yellow centers. Hostas can be a colorful garden all by themselves, although it's wise not to mix too many different variegations.

Iris, too, come in different colored leafage. Iris pseudacorus 'Variegata' has leaves with a bright green and gold stripes running up the leaves - perfect with or without the yellow flowers.

Another plant with intriguing variegated leaves in the Phlox, 'Darwin's Choice.' This one is gorgeous in bloom with its soft pink flowers with a deeper magenta center, but it's a standout even when not in bloom, with leaves edged in yellow green and centered in deeper green. The whole plant looks delicious!

And then there is my favorite foliage plant of all - so lovely that I never really noticed that it actually flowers. I'm talking about Heuchera. A favorite of mine is H. brizoides 'Snowstorm' which is almost white with a pale green margin. Talk about brightening up the shade! As a bonus, it has sprays of bright coral flowers that erupt in a cloud over it all for most of the summer. Another heuchera that I just planted is H. Pewter Moon. I fell in love with their silvery markings on a glowing deep burgundy background. It looks terrific at the feet of Lysimachia 'Firecracker' whose deep purple-green foliage compliments it perfectly.

Another terrific plant is 'Husker Red' penstemon. The stems are garnet red, and the leaves shade from deep garnet to green - lovely when backlit by the sun! This plant was the 1996 plant of the year, and also sports lovely white trumpet flowers whose red stamens perfectly compliment the leaves.

For something cooler, try another plant of the year, the 1995 winner, Perovskia Atriplicifolia - Russian Sage. This plant has cool, silvery stems and leaves, and lavender flowers. It has a ferny, almost cloudy texture that is almost ethereal even when not in bloom. I can think of very few plants that this doesn't blend well with, and have it everywhere in my garden!

Another gray foliaged plant that I would never be without is Lavandula - lavender. Just brushing against the leaves releases that clean, tingly fragrance that is at once so Victorian and so modern. The silvery leaves and lavender or deep purple flowers are a bonus, to me. And it's a wonderful plant for those problem places that are dry and hot.

Mix a few of these lovelies into your greenery and you will have color all season round. If you go about it carefully, you may not even notice when nothing is flowering.