An easy way to create that English Cottage Garden look is to use plants that require very little maintenance and that self seed readily.

This selection of plants will give you a brilliant display of colour in your English Garden all through the spring and summer to early autumn. Just allow them to self seed and they will look after themselves allowing you to sit back and enjoy their blooms.

• Alchemilla mollis – Lady’s Mantle – soft billowing pale yellow flowers

• Aquilegias – shades of pink and purple blooms

• Calendula officinalis or pot marigold – bright yellowy orange flowers

• Candytuft – fragrant – shades of pink, red plus white

• Centaurea cyanus – Cornflower – bright blue blooms

• Foxgloves – tall pink spires

• Lunaria or Honesty – lovely for early spring colour – purpley pink blooms – interesting seed heads.

• Lychnis coronaria – brilliant dark pink flowers – silvery leaves

• Myosotis - Forget-me-not – shades of blue

• Nasturtiums –flowers are bright yellows, oranges and reds

• Nigella - Love-in-a-mist – beautiful blue blooms with seed heads that can be dried and used for winter indoor arrangements.

• Pansies – short plant with shades of purple and white flowers

• Hesperis matronalis - Sweet Rocket – fragrant with white or pink flowers

• Wallflowers – fragrant – all shades of yellows, orange and red

• Violas – delicate fragrant bluey purple blooms, that no English Garden should be without.

Enjoy your English Garden