The Dragon Garden was replanted in 2023 in our version of the Prairie Style. It is intended to look good from Chelsea time right through to the end of the year, and beyond, with its main season being from high summer until late autumn. In spite of the summers intense drought – and enduring the highest ever recorded temperatures – it is currently looking pretty nice!
Our Prairie Style approach to the planting involves many of the larger deciduous grasses such as miscanthus, calamagrostis, panicum, pennisetum, stipa and molinia. While those like panicum are in fact true prairie grasses most have been used for their ability to help us create the feel of an expansive open and grassy space – a stylised prairie.
A soft bark pathway meanders through three large beds and around a central pool, with the path being obscured from view by the plants from many angles – which helps further the illusion of space. Grasses probably take about about 60/70% of the planting area with perennials occupying the remaining 30/40%.
Miscanthus are a quite fabulous group of grasses that can perform so effectively in our gardens, and we have used a number in the planting to provide a later season ‘wow’ of colour and texture and movement.
The initially soft pink flowers of Miscanthus Rosi is perhaps one of the tallest which in spite of its height manages to provide an airy and open, almost sail like effect. Professor Richard Hansen is an older selection with very upright flower stems while Miscanthus Malepartus offers an equally upright habit but shorter and with dark reddish purple flowers. A Knoll Gardens selection Miscanthus Cindy offer a rounded and relatively compact habit with freely produced pendulous soft pink flowers that are held clear of the foliage in a most attractive manner.
Another Knoll Gardens selection, Miscanthus Starlight, is amongst the most compact of miscanthus for our gardens and has a distinctive rounded habit which is almost obscured by the masses of flowers that, like any grass, will light up with the arrival of any sunshine.
Panicum virgatum is a true prairie grass that is quite different in effect from the large showy miscanthus in so far as the individual flowers are quite tiny but are produced with such abundance that they create a cloud like effect that is soft and hazy. Panicum Merlot is a recent and rather fabulous Knoll Gardens selection which was chosen for its masses of red flowers, wine red tinted foliage and its ability to perform in our UK climate. Panicum Sea Mist is a Knoll Gardens selection of a beach rather than prairie grass, so can cope well in sunny and dry conditions – and is performing really well as part of the mix in the Dragon Garden.
Panicum Red Cloud was chosen for its masses of noticeably pinky red flowers but we like it as much for its pretty impressive ‘fall’ foliage colour in multiple shades of warm orange, yellow and tan.
Solidago Fireworks is an especially lovely golden rod that has a very distinctive habit and, like many golden rods, is amazingly popular with all kinds of pollinators.
Another distinctive yellow flowered perennial is Helianthus Lemon Queen whose combination of height, durability and masses of soft lemon yellow flowers work so effectively with many of the grasses.
Equally welcome is the relatively tall and later flowering Boltonia asteroides, whose masses of refined white daisy like flowers add yet another layer of flower and texture to the autumnal procession.
Quite apart from their other qualities the flowers of many of the grasses, such as miscanthus, panicum and pennisetum, will appear literally as if to light up whenever they are viewed with the sunlight behind them – be it morning or evening sunshine. Offering a free, if transitory, light show whenever it happens.
Of all the grasses perhaps none are more, almost magically, transformed than the fountain grasses – the pennisetums. And a Knoll Gardens selection, Pennisetum Black Arrow, is no exception. Always performing so beautifully whenever seen in low sunlight.
