Last fall I was moving some dayliles around and must not have been thinking properly or was working too fast or whatever. In any case, I'm paying the price now. This is one of the dayliles I moved:

Although orange is not one of my favorite colors, I do like it (in the right season) and do like this particular flower and would like it lots more if it were in my predominantly orange garden not the other mixed beds.

Now imagine that flower with lots of paler lavender flowers blooming very close by. Throw in some nice chartreuse foliage also nearby and you get the idea. Right now I look at that particular bed and want to vomit on the spot!

Of course the daylily plant is HUGE with flowers coming non-stop and they will probably continue to come non-stop for at least another week. Lucky me! I'm so tempted to cut them all off, but I doubt I will. Maybe, it's so tempting.

Note to self: Think before you move a non-blooming plant.

Kevin

Right now, I'm looking at an unfortunate side of my garden where 5 perennials are blooming at the same time and they're all exactly the same color of purple. Not exactly the look I was going for.

Also, the red and yellow orinpet lilies that came up next to my Pow Wow Wildberry echinacea looked pretty scary.

There is one pairing in our neighborhood that makes me wince it is so jarring: Canna Tropicana and blue agapanthus. Can you picture those together?

Well, this year, the plant reverted back to basic Echinacea pink - yikes!

It's getting moved in the fall.

When I moved here there were already 30 mature clumps of daylilies growing in the full sun garden that bloomed mostly in either burgundy, yellow or gold. The only color I've introduced for contrast with them in that bed is white rose of Sharon. All the other beds I've planted since moving here were designed on paper long before I stuck a spade in the turf, taking into account foliage color & texture as well as bloom time/color. Judging by the above posts, I guess doing my homework ahead of time has served me & my little green acre well.

Best of luck to all of you in resolving your spectrum challenges. Makes me glad I spent years studying landscaping books as well as gardening how-to references prior to designing my garden beds. Truly, I'm not being smug--simply thankful.

I don't care how much silver foliage you use (unless its several feet worth), red-violet (ie, magenta) is always going to look awful next to a red-orange plant. They clash. OTOH, a saturated deep violet looks fantastic next to a pure, saturated orange.

And I agree that plant shape is also a factor in whether plants look great together. A contrast in texture is just as important as anything else.

Good grief, I didn't mean to start a war here.

My daylily does not work where it's at. Moving that one plant is simpler than changing the entire bed.

a2zmom - OMG! That is hilarious and just about as ugly as you can get. Congrats!

To describe what you prefer and what you like, is much different then suggesting that anything beyond what you like is wrong, well....it's just wrong. lol

There really is no wrong or right in combining plants based on design criteria, if it is someone's garden and they just love it that way. On the other hand, if they are unhappy with their garden and can't figure out why, then whatever you are doing that makes you happy, is great information to share.

I would be extremely bored not trying out colors and combinations. That is when the magic of surprise plant partnerships and the humor of 'good grief that didn't work as planned' comes about! I am always trying out unfamiliar plants or plants that are not supposed to be grown in my zone--some of my garden favorites have come from such risks. (The ag inspector has given me a few odd looks on occasion, too. lol)

The best learning and understanding comes from first hand experimenting and, yes, mistakes. And the best gardening magic also comes from experimenting and the unexpected. Loosen up the reins a little and have fun with plants. No one is going to die if some plant combinations do not result in a pleasing visual. :)

and greatplains, even if I had a mass grouping of that comeflower, for me personally it would still look awful with those particular oranges and yellows. Color is very subjective and what works for one person, makes another person's teeth ache. It's just one of those things.

I don't think it is anyone's desire to insult anyone else here. I'll apologize right now for my style of writing (even not knowing which poster you are directing this towards, or if it is more broad.) My thought and writing style is direct and research-like and no shortage of attempts over the years to write in a softened style has succeeded. So it is how it is.

But I love having a broad range of opinions and ideas presented in the forums. If someone disagrees about parts of previous posts, I for one, would love to hear, and see photos, why! Some gardens have bent the so-called rules, and are wonderful. And I tuck away and borrow such information for future use.

I can even present for case for Tropicana cannas and agapanthus working together. Honest. But really, must we tip-toe in the gardening forums? I learn when people share their thoughts, opinions and ideas. Even strong ones that may not be near my own. It all gets taken in for consideration.

I don't mind direct thinking and writing style at all. Especially from someone who has no intent to insult and who is quick to apologize. And for someone who takes that approach, I don't see how you can get yourself in trouble at all, even without 'tip-toeing'.

I'm just sharing another opinion about how such different opinions can be shared more easily with a small adjustment in words chosen. That's all. I personally wasn't insulted. I am fairly conservative about color choice and I don't even own a Canna or Agapanthus. (g) And I didn't even look to see who it was that said what, so it was a general response to words and phrases used.

Frankly, I have seen some horrors on these forums (to my mind - those gardens with acres of mulch and the odd puny little plant for example) but unless an opinion is solicited, I tend to keep my counsel and say nothing. When someone actually posts a picture and requests feedback, I fail to see that they can complain when they get it. Are we 6 year olds, running to mummy when the world is a bit sharper than you might have hoped? Or should we all simply waffle on meaninglessly, passing out little vanilla compliments? I repeat, we are talking about gardening......and yes, I do care intensely about this plant or that choice but I can hardly expect the world to agree with me.....and when it doesn't, I am not thinking 'oh, what horrible mean people (more like, fools, they just cannot see it) On the other hand, if someone said I was mean and cruel and hateful, with horrible children and a poor grasp of politics (they would really get the sharp edge of my tongue).
.

About the only time something in the area of color gets my negative attention is when a plant advertised as red or "carmine" turns out to be pink.

In my effort to be brief, maybe I was not clear, so I will clarify my comment. I have no problem with anyone sharing their own opinion, their likes their dislikes. None. That’s what we are here for. Nor do I feel like we need to make ‘little vanilla compliments’, or not give a meaningful and honest opinion when asked.

If you say ‘Red and yellow together sets my teeth on edge’, that is your opinion. Which would bring a smile to my face. If instead you say, ‘Red and yellow together are wrong’, then you are saying that your opinion applies to everyone. Now you’ve made it a rule, that red doesn’t go with yellow. And my response would be, Really? Who said? I’m pretty sure we would all agree there are no rules about combining color. An opinion that has already been expressed on this thread by others.

I do find rudeness to be unwelcome and unnecessary and find it surprising that you seem to view it as something of value somehow? Rudeness is just another name for disrespect.

The truth is, nothing I believe is set in stone; everthing is constantly being reevaluated with every bit of new information. Not that I am a pushover, by any means, but I love hearing all sides of everything. Then my researcher mind sorts out what makes the most sense from what I know up to the current point in time and re-sorts others tidbits for different applications. I understand few people process input in that manner, but it works ok for my life, even if not so great in forum format. That a brain rewiring just isn't in my lifetime financial budget kind of seals that deal. lol

Even a2zmom's much voted combination photo had me thinking. The echinacea is too jarring, but adds interest. If you cover up that plant in the photo with a thumb over the monitor, that garden view becomes too serine. (It probably isn't from a different view of the garden or a home garden, but for the exercise of idea-shooting for resorts.) So I run ideas for plants that would add the contrast interest, but be more harmonious with the setting, as an exercise.

In my own garden, I am growing yellow-flowering Tecoma stans and pink-flowering trumpet tree. I love both plants, yet I dislike bright yellow and bold pink together. To make friends when they overlap bloom, I am experimenting with using an alstroemeria that has a combined yellow and pink flower. If I think it works next spring, I'll have a new battle plan for when that situation comes up in the future. If not, I'll try something else the following season. It is color theoristing for the real world! :)

I am trying to be more deliberate with my garden and focus on pleasing plant combinations instead of the random assortment if plants I generally end up with. Planning a garden in paper is hard for me. I enjoy seeing well combined plants, but honestly, I also enjoy seeing rows of flowers, as in for cut flower farms. (Thinks back dreamily to photos of dahlia growers....).
Anyways, reading different view points does help me clarify my desires for MY garden, which I get to grow as it pleases me (within the confines of my given environment and set of laws). I can read people's statements and consider whether or not they are consistent with my garden vision or goals.

In the spirit of having a good laugh at ones self, I'll share this picture of the train wreck I have going on now.
Enjoy!

I really appreciate the photo. That was exactly my intent for this thread - humor - and admitting sometimes we screw up (based on our own standards of course).

I found your comment about rows of flowers interesting and it brought back memories of my parents garden and even my grandmothers garden. Rows ruled. Everything was planted in rows. The straighter the row, the more evenly spaced the row, the better. A good row was what it was all about. I haven't thought about that in ages, but that's the way it was.

For the record, I don't do rows well.

Kevin

There was only one combination that I can remember that was really awful and it was when I added Penstemon 'Iron Maiden' to a bed, thinking it would look great with the purple of Perovskia and some other purples in the bed. I had grown the Penstemon from seed and hadn't seen the color except in a photo. I forgot there were pinks in the bed and the Perovskia and Penstemon missed each other when they bloomed. It was so awful I cut the flower heads off the Penstemon and I don't even have a photo of it.

I definitely play it safe using pinks, roses, purples, with a touch of pale yellows and whites. When you have a small property, I think it's hard to set aside separate areas to do completely different color schemes, too.

I looked for that Penstemon photo and all I could come up with is a container that I put together using 'Alaska' Nasturtium for the foliage forgetting it had orange flowers. I don't enjoy this combo of pink and orange...

Kevin

Say what you will, I think color combos are usually a matter of personal taste and it's probably the plant shapes and growth habits that cause most of the problems.

Instead of the hybrid lupines, how about the wild ones with wispy silvery foliage and delicate blue spikes? And instead of major blocks of saturated color, what about dots and dabs of yarrow, columbine and penstemon, interspersed with grasses and seed pods of bygone plants? Just my two cents on that particular image and setting.

Hm, I look at that image some more and realize it's Mt. Moran, in the Tetons of Wyoming. So the photo may be in a national park, in which case it's definitely photoshopped, or it may be on the property of someone who is both incredibly lucky and inconceivably wealthy to own a piece of land in that particular spot.

It's a great case study though, and provides yet another example of "different strokes for different folks."

Prairiemoon-I love the photo, photoshopped or not. I like all the bright colors. Plus, it shows tons of bearded irises which are my all-time favorite flower.

The point of the photo though, was as an example of so many different colors and shades of colors together and I don’t really notice a clash. Which I thought might go along with what GreatPlains was saying, that some times adding another plant or color changes the effect of colors that might clash on their own. It sort of reminds me of Monet's garden and how much over the top plantings on a large scale he used.

flower-frenzy, see I like your orange and pink saturated colors much better than the pastel pink and apricot color of my pot. That’s a pretty marigold too, reminds me of Queen Sophia. I love bearded Iris too.

GreatPlains, I’m sure you are right about my pot. I thought the variegated leaves at least brought some interest. And I sometimes like a pot of just an overflowing single plant, too, which might seem boring to most people.

From early September 2012:

I don't have any real close-ups of the combination (not really one I want to take pictures of!) but you can see the two colors and that they are both healthy, dense plants in this view:

The purple one seeds around like mad! One popped up in the middle of my dwarf Korean lilac a few years ago and I've left it there because it makes the lilac look like it's blooming in the fall! Short lilac;tall aster:

On the subject of purple and orange combinations - there's one I like in the garden that is really the neighbour's combination. I leave one small clump of orange 'ditch daylilies' that crept under the fence - because I like how it goes with their purple Jackmani clematis that spills over the fence above it! Note that the clematis color is what I consider to be purple - not the colors called purple that look pink to me :-)

This 'Paprika rose' with culinary sage flowers is sort of a lighter version of the same basic combination. The Paprika flowers open a stronger orangy color but fade with age. The rose is in my 'hot' area that shades from pink trough peach to orange and rusy reds.

I like to play with colors but do have strong likes and dislikes. There is very little yellow in the garden for instance - in large part because there is a very large chunk of yellow in the garden - the house! So any yellow has to work with that, and it's not easy to find one that does.

flower-frenzy - Yes, I love that too.

Another thing I've noticed about myself is I really get into more off-beat color combos in spring and fall. I was browsing some fall catalogs this week and coming up with some really wonderful tulip combinations with colors I normally wouldn't try during the summer months. In fact, it was difficult for me to come up with combos I didn't like. Same goes for fall, I just seem to crave all the color I can get in any combo I can get. I would assume it has something to do with being color starved by spring and anticipating the color deprivation when winter finally arrives. I love beds totally devoted to mums in every color - all randomly mixed. I works for me.

Kevin

My neighbor down the road has some kind of palm tree planted in their front yard. The problem is that I've yet to see a truly tropical plant look good here as it's just too cold in the winter. Her tree is droopy and dead one one side, but still she keeps it because it "goes" with the cannas planted in a circle around it. To top off the tropical theme, she has one lone pot (complete with 80's floral themed stencils) of crocosmia 'Lucifer' in the front surrounded by 3 small potted begonias. They are peach.

My neighbor accross the street takes the cake, though. Her grass is dead, except for the weeds sticking up out of it. Then, she has two shrubs in front of her house that are each bare on one side. To top it all off, she decided to "plant" her driveway by lining it with marigolds planted in styrofoam cups. It's awesome. Lol.

The first house I bought had plastic flowers stuck into the dirt. Talk about a low maintenance planting!

In my current neighborhood, someone has one of those tallish thin shrubs. On either side are two much smaller shrubs, clipped into round shapes, The overall effect is exceptionally phallic to say the least.

A2Z-wow, phallic is right. They've probably never went outside and took a good hard look. Then again, maybe it's on purpose. You never know with people these days!

I planted a 'Tie Dye' Helenium in back of my 'Becky Towe' Phlox this spring, because I really wanted a Helenium (one of my fav plants) in this bed. All I can say is "EWWW!". It might have worked if Tie Dye had ACTUALLY had "purple-pink shades" like was touted, but alas it does not!
CMK

New variety with rolled up petals described as yellow and purple-pink by the breeder - ignore this they're yellow and orangey-red but still very nice

So yeah, with that particluar pink you've got, for me that clashes badly. Love the rose campion with Becky. A big stand would look great.

Bright pink and orange are tougher for me to embrace, but if one of the flowers were smaller and airy...I could see it. Part of the problem could be my reaction to pelagoniums in general. But that is a whole 'nother thread topic.

I read the posts on the neighborhood gardens last night and had a good laugh. I'm not sure which one was the most surprising... the tall tree stumps with cactus growing out of them, the long row of shrubs of different varieties all equal distance apart and pruned into squares, or the red and yellow annuals in place of a lawn. I must live in a very boring area, because I can't even think of anyone's front yard that competes with that...lol.

Woody, your asters are so large! I always trim mine back by half before they set buds so they will bloom later for me, and I missed one this year that was in the middle of a bed and I cant' believe how tall it is. Is it the color combo you dislike? It's hard to tell from the photo, is it pink and purple? I love your Lilac blooming in the fall. Maybe you'll start a new fad. (g)

I really love orange and purples/blues together! I know posting a "like" combo is off topic to this thread but...

Here is an orangey Salpiglossis with 'Freelander Blue' Prunella. Some Carex buchananii hair made its way into the shot as well, lol.
CMK

Well, I think not a lot of people have photos of ugly color combinations. Either everyone is great at putting color together in their gardens, or they play it safe like me, or they don’t take photos of them, like me too. Maybe I should be trying to get a little more wild in my color choices. (g)

I had a dear friend who I swore must have been color blind, as every year she would buy a huge mish-mash of annuals - all types, all colors - and plant them randomly in her beds. I found it rather jarring and uncoordinated. She loved it. To each her own!

Dee

The reason why I'm asking is because I've seen an English nurseryman describing it as with "running habit". And I've never met an Alcea with a running habit.

All the color snobs just better never go to Mexico and see how they do flowers there. Well, some places there anyway. I kind of agree with maybe it was greatplains and the idea that it isn't just color but form and style that can sometimes clash. I really like orange and purple, pink and orange, pink and yellow-- there's a lot of ways that these colors can be great together.

One of my disappointments was some intermediate iris that had a much longer period of bloom than I was expecting, and their dark apricot pink really clashed with the tall bearded iris that were next to bloom. They look much nicer now that I have moved them. I think you can plan, but there are always surprises like that.

I haven't decided if I like Dianthus Firewitch next to Lil Sunshine caryopteris on one side and Happy Returns on the other with Allium sphael in between. They didn't all bloom at the same time, but I really liked it in the spring, and I really liked the allium.

Supposedly it's more rust resistant than Alcea rosea but truthfully, looks just as rusty by the end of the season as ever other hollyhock I've ever grown. Oddly enough, I have one group that grows in dappled sunlight and they got a lot less rust and a lot less Japanese beetle damage.

I was a veggie and tree/shrub gardener for years at my previous house, thinking that flowers were too "froufrou". Then I moved to this house and realized there was no sun in the back yard for a veggie garden, and started to grow perennials.

My first perennial garden (the front garden) was in 2005 and it was colorful and happy, but ouch I was such a newbie there were there some ugly combos. Here's one - short and squat red and orange 'Magellan' Zinnias and tall gangly pink cleome. Oh and throw in the blue foliage of Dianthus firewitch. Yuck!

I'm a color disaster. My wife frequently points it out in my clothing choices and even I can pick it out in the garden. But it doesn't bother me and having such a lousy track record makes it look like I walked on water when I get it halfway right!
Here's a bad one. It's got variegation, chartreuse, pastels and a bold red... and a couple weeds for good measure.