It's time to go a bit potty

Fill your baskets and containers with colour, says Ruth

- Ruth Hayes

WE all need cheering up at the moment and we need to bring the brightness back into our lives – and what better way to do that in the garden than to plant a container, basket or window box?

Now the novelty of garden centres reopening has started to wear off a bit and the crowds have dispersed, you should be able to make the most of their bountiful stocks of patio plants. But if the rush continues and the brightest have already been bought, don’t be despondent as there are so many alternatives to jolly flowers. Herbs, grasses and foliage plants such as trailing variegated ivy and catmint, coleus and grey-green Centaurea cineraria create a wealth of eye-catching contrasts.

You can even plant up hanging baskets with delicious edible herbs, such as radishes, cut-and-come-again salads and trailing tomato plants!

And if stock is low, buy plants that you know will grow to fill gaps or create impact with ‘less is more’ – I’m thinking flamboyant fuchsias and those heady velvet-petalled trailing petunias.