Plan a bed

Plants with fall colour in their leaves

Shrubs, perennials and grasses whose leaves turn red, orange or gold in fall, for a bed that ends the year on fire.

The forests of eastern North America have some of the best fall colour in the world, and many of the plants here come from them: fothergillas, sweetspire, sumacs, chokeberries, oakleaf hydrangeas and blueberries. They are joined by the Japanese maples and smokebushes, by grasses such as switchgrass and little bluestem, and by a few perennials, such as bluestar and the hardy geraniums, whose leaves turn as well as any shrub's.

The yellows and oranges are in the leaf all summer, hidden by green, and show as the green breaks down. The reds are made fresh each fall, and are brightest after sunny days and cool nights. That is why fall colour is better in sun than in shade, and better in some years than others.

Every plant here is recorded as colouring in fall. In the lists they are by where they go in a bed, so a run of colour from the front to the back can be chosen from them.

105 plants: 26 perennials, 2 ferns, 12 grasses and 65 shrubs.

The dozen to start with

  • Oakleaf hydrangea

    Oakleaf hydrangea

    6½ ft · mid June to early August

    A native shrub for every season: cone-shaped white flowers that age to pink, huge oak-shaped leaves that turn wine red and purple in autumn, and peeling, cinnamon-coloured bark in winter.

  • Dwarf fountain grass 'Hameln'

    Dwarf fountain grass 'Hameln'

    2½ ft · late July to mid September

    A neat, arching mound topped with fuzzy bottle-brush plumes from late summer.

  • Switchgrass 'Northwind'

    Switchgrass 'Northwind'

    5½ ft · early August to early October · host plant

    The most upright switchgrass: a narrow, rigid column of olive-blue leaves that never flops, turning gold in autumn and standing through winter.

  • Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation'

    Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation'

    3½ ft · early August to mid September · host plant

    A little bluestem selected to stay bolt upright even in rich soil.

  • Laceleaf Japanese maple 'Crimson Queen'

    Laceleaf Japanese maple 'Crimson Queen'

    8 ft · grown for its leaves · host plant

    A low, weeping dome of thread-fine, deep crimson foliage that cascades to the ground and turns scarlet in autumn.

  • Lilac 'Miss Kim'

    Lilac 'Miss Kim'

    6 ft · late May to mid June

    A compact, rounded lilac with purple buds that open to icy lavender, fragrant flowers, later than the common lilac.

  • Smokebush 'Royal Purple'

    Smokebush 'Royal Purple'

    11½ ft · early June to late July

    Rounded leaves of deep wine purple all season, turning scarlet in autumn, with hazy, smoke-like plumes of pinkish flower stalks in summer.

  • Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'

    Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'

    3½ ft · late May to late June

    Velvety, deep violet-purple flowers, close to black in bud, stand above a sheaf of narrow, grassy leaves.

  • Peony 'Karl Rosenfield'

    Peony 'Karl Rosenfield'

    3 ft · late May to mid June

    Large, double flowers of bright crimson red on strong stems.

  • False Solomon's seal

    False Solomon's seal

    2½ ft · early May to early June

    Arching stems of pleated leaves end in a creamy, scented plume of flowers in spring, followed by red berries.

  • Frost grass

    Frost grass

    4½ ft · late July to early September

    Leaves held out horizontally from upright stems give it the look of a small bamboo.

  • Royal fern

    Royal fern

    5 ft · grown for its leaves

    The largest hardy fern: broad fronds with well-spaced, oblong leaflets like those of a locust tree, tipped with rusty spore clusters.

A bed planned only from these plants

The planner was given only the plants on this page that suit zone 6 and full sun, and designed this 16 × 8 ft (4.9 × 2.4 m) bed from them when the page was made.

A 16 × 8 ft (4.9 × 2.4 m) bed at eye level in late May: Striped bloody cranesbill, Bloody cranesbill, Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation', Switchgrass 'Shenandoah', Dwarf fothergilla, Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother', Lowbush blueberry.
A 16 × 8 ft (4.9 × 2.4 m) naturalistic planting in zone 6, full sun, seen from the path in late May.
6. Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'66. Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'66. Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'66. Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'66. Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother'63. Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation'33. Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation'33. Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation'35. Dwarf fothergilla52. Bloody cranesbill22. Bloody cranesbill22. Bloody cranesbill22. Bloody cranesbill22. Bloody cranesbill21. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill12. Bloody cranesbill27. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry74. Switchgrass 'Shenandoah'41. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill11. Striped bloody cranesbill17. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry77. Lowbush blueberry7
From above, to scale. Each circle is one plant, as wide as the room it needs.

The plants

  1. 1 Striped bloody cranesbill × 16, pink
  2. 2 Bloody cranesbill × 6, white
  3. 3 Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation' × 3, tan
  4. 4 Switchgrass 'Shenandoah' × 1, green leaves
  5. 5 Dwarf fothergilla × 1, white
  6. 6 Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother' × 5, purple
  7. 7 Lowbush blueberry × 12, white

Planned as a naturalistic planting: low grasses and groundcovers, the matrix, make up 54% of the planted ground. Little bluestem 'Standing Ovation' and Siberian iris 'Caesar's Brother' anchor the back corners of the bed: the tallest plants on the plan stand there. There is more striped bloody cranesbill than anything else, 16 plants in all. Every line of the Design check comes out Good or better.

The planner's own design check: 7 Excellent, 9 Good.

Open this bed in the planner Change its size, the sun or the style, move plants about, or swap one for another.

All 105 plants

Show all 105, by where they go in a bed

Front of a bed 19

Middle of a bed 27

Back of a bed 59

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