Seasonal shift

In the first of a new container-planting series, James Horner, garden maker at Benton End, the one-time home of the artist and plantsman Cedric Morris, suggests three arrangements to celebrate spring

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The flora in Benton End’s walled garden has dwindled since the time artist-plantsman Cedric Morris gardened here. Yet one of the persistent and surviving plants, which still appears exotic today, is the crown imperial fritillary. These chunky-stemmed plants rise through late-winter, flowering as soon as the season shifts, when they become a blazing statement. Morris painted both yellow- and orange-flowered cultivars among tulips and wood spurge in his 1934 work Easter Bouquet.

How to achieve the look

Container and composition

I found this galvanised water tank tumbled down a hedge bank, covered in brambles, on a countryside project I worked on several years ago. The landowners kindly let me take it, and I’ve created many plantings in it since. I like to try short-term displays in a container of this scale, although it would serve well as a planter for a small tree. If you find something similar, start by punching drainage holes through the base.

The tracery of the twiggy Prunus tenella is shown off best against a dark backdrop. Its grey branches seem as similarly cold as the metal container and it is the fieriness of the crown imperial fritillaries, which, by contrast, offer warmth and signal the change in season.

Cultivation and care

Such a container takes a lot of soil to fill it, which can be expensive. I’ve used cut turf sods at the bottom, but a home-made compost, clean of perennial weeds, would be great. The soil level will sink over time but can be topped up with a sterilised, loam-based growing medium every winter, especially easy if the planting is short term.

The creamy, goblet-shaped tulip, T. ‘Purissima’, is early flowering and reliably perennial. This large specimen of