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Plants with blue flowers

Plants with blue flowers, and how to use blue: it recedes, cools and makes a bed look longer.

True blue is rare among flowers, and many a "blue" flower is violet in the garden. Blue is a cool colour, and cool colours recede: blue at the far end of a bed makes it look longer, which is why Gertrude Jekyll set her borders' blues at the ends and the hot colours in the middle.

Blue sits beautifully with soft yellow and with silver leaves, and it fades at dusk while white glows. Every plant here comes in blue.

161 plants: 129 perennials, 19 bulbs and 13 shrubs.

The dozen to start with

  • Siberian iris

    Siberian iris

    2½ ft · late May to late June

    Elegant, butterfly-like flowers in early summer above clumps of slender, grassy leaves.

  • Bigleaf hydrangea

    Bigleaf hydrangea

    5 ft · late June to late August

    The classic mophead and lacecap hydrangea, with big, glossy leaves and large flower heads.

  • Polyanthus primrose

    Polyanthus primrose

    8 in · late March to mid May

    Large, bright flowers in almost every colour, most with a yellow eye, in clusters on a single stout stalk above a rosette of crinkled leaves.

  • Grape hyacinth

    Grape hyacinth

    6 in · mid April to early May

    Tight spikes of cobalt-blue beads that make a river of colour under taller spring bulbs.

  • Rosemary

    Rosemary

    4 ft · early March to early May

    The kitchen herb: a dense, aromatic, evergreen shrub with needle-like leaves and small, pale blue flowers from late winter into spring.

  • Bugleweed

    Bugleweed

    6 in · early May to late May

    Glossy, dark rosettes knit into a dense carpet that smothers weeds in shade.

  • Delphinium

    Delphinium

    5 ft · late June to mid July

    The great blue spire of the English border: dense columns of flowers up to head height in early summer.

  • Hyacinth

    Hyacinth

    10 in · mid April to early May

    Dense, waxy spikes of intensely fragrant flowers in blue, purple, pink, white or soft yellow, in mid-spring.

  • Rose of Sharon

    Rose of Sharon

    10 ft · mid July to mid September

    An upright shrub with hollyhock-like flowers in pink, purple, white or violet-blue from midsummer to autumn, when few shrubs flower.

  • Blue allium

    Blue allium

    20 in · early June to late June

    Small, dense globes of true sky blue on thin stems in early summer.

  • Siberian squill

    Siberian squill

    5 in · late March to mid April

    Nodding bells of the most intense, electric blue in early spring.

  • Bluebeard

    Bluebeard

    3 ft · early August to mid September

    A small, grey-leaved shrub covered in clusters of true blue flowers in late summer, humming with bees.

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 mid May: Carpathian bellflower, Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue', Smooth aster 'Bluebird', Bluebeard 'Dark Knight', Italian bugloss 'Dropmore', Wild lupine, Arkansas bluestar, Peach-leaved bellflower, Glory-of-the-snow, Dutch iris, Spring starflower.
A 16 × 8 ft (4.9 × 2.4 m) cottage garden in zone 6, full sun, seen from the path in mid May.
5. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'53. Smooth aster 'Bluebird'33. Smooth aster 'Bluebird'33. Smooth aster 'Bluebird'34. Bluebeard 'Dark Knight'47. Arkansas bluestar72. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'21. Carpathian bellflower11. Carpathian bellflower11. Carpathian bellflower11. Carpathian bellflower11. Carpathian bellflower12. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'22. Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue'23. Smooth aster 'Bluebird'35. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'55. Italian bugloss 'Dropmore'58. Peach-leaved bellflower88. Peach-leaved bellflower88. Peach-leaved bellflower86. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine66. Wild lupine68. Peach-leaved bellflower88. Peach-leaved bellflower810. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris10. Dutch iris11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower11. Spring starflower9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow9. Glory-of-the-snow
From above, to scale. Each circle is one plant, as wide as the room it needs.

The plants

  1. 1 Carpathian bellflower × 5, blue
  2. 2 Creeping phlox 'Emerald Blue' × 8, blue
  3. 3 Smooth aster 'Bluebird' × 4, blue
  4. 4 Bluebeard 'Dark Knight' × 1, blue
  5. 5 Italian bugloss 'Dropmore' × 8, blue
  6. 6 Wild lupine × 8, blue
  7. 7 Arkansas bluestar × 1, blue
  8. 8 Peach-leaved bellflower × 5, white
  9. 9 Glory-of-the-snow × 12, pink
  10. 10 Dutch iris × 7, purple
  11. 11 Spring starflower × 12, blue

Planned as a cottage garden: 40 of the 40 plants (100%), bulbs aside, stand alone or in groups of no more than five, small enough for the kinds to mingle. Early colour comes from bulbs planted between the other plants: glory-of-the-snow and spring starflower. The flowering is at its height in mid May, with 4 kinds out together.

The planner's own design check: 11 Excellent, 6 Good. It flags one thing to watch: Nothing on this plan is highly poisonous or an aggressive spreader.

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

All 161 plants

Show all 161, by where they go in a bed

Front of a bed 79

Middle of a bed 56

Back of a bed 26

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