Church Rose Garden

An existing client whose garden I had revamped asked me for some help with improving a rose garden at their local church.  A sunny border adjacent to the church building had already been carefully planted with roses in a grid formation.  The border contained a variety of roses in a mix of beautiful bold colours.  Although the roses were lovely, there were large gaps between the plants.  This meant that weeds were a constant problem.

I began by adding further roses into the border.  This reduced the spacing between the plants, whilst still maintaining a formal layout pattern.  I chose to repeat rose varieties that were already in the border, rather than adding new, and selected those that seemed to be growing best in the existing soil.  These included the coppery orange Rosa ‘Troika’, and the salmon pink Rosa ‘Blessings’.  In the spaces between the roses I planted Alchemilla mollis to provide much needed ground cover, as well as Salvias in a cool shade of lilac to balance the bright hues of the roses.

It was great to see how the plants filled out over the course of the summer.  The newly revamped border provides a welcome display of colour and foliage interest for anyone visiting the church.