A Gardener's Guide to a Cottage Garden:

Many people dm of a coge in the country, with roses grow around the door and a feast of color in the gen in front. Well, the good news is t you do not need to move to the country or even h a coge to cte such an attractive gen.

W is a coge gen? It is very difficult to define a coge gen. We all know one when we see one, but describ them is not the easiest th to do. Generally, t h an old fashioned look. The l skill in ct a successful coge gen is to design the bors to look as if t h not been designed at all. There is not much in the way of h dscap, just flowerbeds, and these full to the brim with colorful pts.

Traditionally, the pts would be tough, hy ones t needed little c. Most would be pts t had been grown for generations, such as primulas, hollyhocks, foxgloves and aquilegias. Today many hybrids considered suitable, especially if t bright and brash.

So, w coge pts? Pts for a coge gen tend, as has aldy been noted, to be old fashioned pts t h been around for years. Many annuals and biennials t self sow, so the gener does not h to think about new pts, t just appear.

One son for us these old favorites, apart from their appearance is t t usually less prone to pests and diseases and hier n many modern cultivars (which is why t h been around for a long time). In other words, t need little look after. Unfortunately, some of these traditional pts, such as lupins and hollyhocks, h now developed diseases and pests, which makes them less reliable n t once were, though t can still be grown to gt effect as short lived pts.

Here some examples of pts t can be used for a coge gen. There Alcea Rosea, Anemone x hybrida, Aquilegia vulgaris, Aster novae-angliae, Lupinus, Viola, Primula, Pulmonaria, Lilium candidum and Geum rivale.