Navigating Orange

A garden designer's favorite orange plants throughout the year

http://www.mountgardens.com

Daniel Mount hails from a long line of wandering gardeners, nurserymen and farmers. He received his first shovel for his…

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One of the least popular colors on the spectrum, orange is bold, exotic, and maybe a little bit dangerous.

From “A Gardener Comes to Terms with Orange:

Orange, the marriage of red and yellow, maintains both the primal force of red and the happy-go-lucky, child-like brightness of yellow.

… The adventurous Christopher Lloyd, who considered orange “challenging,” advised using the hue boldly or not at all. “It is a waste to mingle it with red,” he warned, recommending pink, purple, and blue, its complement, as orange’s best garden betrothals.

Hamamellis ×intermedia ‘Jelena’ ignites a grim February day in Seattle. Photo: Daniel Mount

Winter:

Cotoneaster lacteus; C. glaucophyllus; C. salicifolius ‘Scarlet Leader’

Hamamellis ×intermedia ‘Jelena’

Pyracantha ‘Mohave’ Photo: Daniel Mount

Pyracantha ‘Mohave’

Rosa glauca; R. moyesii; R. rubiginosa; R. rugosa

The winter sun on rose hips. Photo: Daniel Mount

Raucous fields of spring tulips in the Skagit Valley. Photo: Daniel Mount

Spring:

Aquilegia skinnerii ‘Tequila Sunrise’

Calendula ‘Alpha’; C. ‘Orange King’; C. ‘Porcupine’; C. ‘Radio’

Cheiranthus allionii

Epimedium ×warleyense

Eremurus ‘Cleopatra’

Eschscholzia californica

Euphorbia griffithii ‘Fireglow’

Glaucium corniculatum

Tulipa whittalii Photo: Daniel Mount

Hyacinthus ‘Gypsy Queen’

Narcissus ‘Bantam’; N. ‘Brackenhust’; N. ‘Gentle Giant’; N. ‘Professor Einstein’

Primula bulleyana

Papaver orientalis ‘Fireball’; P. ‘Goliath’; P. ‘Turkenlouis’; P. rupifragum

Tulipa ‘Perestroyka’; T. ‘Orange Emperor’; T. ‘Mango Charm’; T. ‘Annie Schilder’; T. ‘Shogun’; T. ‘Elise’; T. vvdenskyi ‘Tangerine Beauty’; T. whittalii