Top ten winter bedding plants

Brighten up your garden with some winter colour Image: aemerale

Looking for a splash of colour to brighten up your winter garden? Here we present our pick of some of our favourite winter bedding plants – the perfect blooms and berries to cheer you up as the evenings draw in and the temperature falls.

Pansy

1979 was the year the ‘universal’ pansy first leapt onto the gardening scene. The first cultivar of its kind, it turned the cold, dark days of winter into glorious technicolor. As the first pansy to bloom during the winter months, it literally revolutionised the way we garden.

Of course now there are lots of winter-flowering pansies and violas to choose from, so why not grab yourself a quality pansy mix and get sowing? Plant yours in sun or semi-shade and enjoy blooms from January right through to mid May.

Primrose

A cottage garden favourite, many prize primroses for their delightfully buttery spring blooms. But these little plants have much more to offer – in fact not only do modern cultivars give you a full rainbow of colours to choose from, they also flower from mid-January on. Bring on your plug plants in pots indoors or in the greenhouse and gradually harden off over seven to ten days before planting them out in their final positions.

Like pansies and violas, primroses love full sun and semi shade, and are a great way to brighten up borders, pots, and even winter hanging baskets.

Clematis

An evergreen climber with creamy bell-shaped flowers that fade to brilliant white as winter gives way to spring, clematis is one plant winter gardeners love to include in their planting schemes. Grow yours up a wall or fence and enjoy its lush foliage all year round.

Dull winter days make pale flowers stand out like stars against the night sky – and clematis is no exception. Check out no-prune varieties like 'Winter Beauty' for the ultimate in easy care gardening – just choose a shady spot with moist, well-drained soil and you’re ‘good to grow’.

Cyclamen

With their delicate pink ‘butterfly’ blooms, these 'Latinia Success' cyclamen are a wonderful way to bring a splash of colour to damp ground.

Cyclamen bloom from Mid February to mid-May before entering a resting phase during the summer months. For best results, plant your shooting stars in semi shade – enjoy them in wooded or pondside locations where the dainty flowers stand out against a darker background.

Heather

Not keen on spending damp chilly days tending a winter garden? The beauty of heather is that it combines a dazzling display with low maintenance and great coverage, making it the ideal winter bedding plant for beds, borders, containers, and more.

Check out this 'Snow Queen' variety whose crisp white blooms stand out beautifully against the vibrant evergreen foliage. A tough moorland plant, heather loves well-drained soil in full sun, but will grow almost anywhere, its scented flowers providing a welcome supply of early spring nectar for pollinators.

Holly

Not strictly a bedding plant, but surely a must for the discerning winter gardener, with its stunning red berries, holly lends rich colour to your winter planting scheme. Perfect when grown as a hedge, holly forms a natural security screen that’s hard to beat, and provides a welcome food source for hungry songbirds.

Alternatively, opt for a holly tree which, with bright, spherical berries during the winter months, also provides summer interest through its pretty display of white spring flowers. Holly loves sun or semi shade and grows well in pots or directly in the ground.

Viola

A wonderfully versatile plant, violas offer dense coverage and delightful blooms, and are as happy in a woodland setting as they are, edging borders or filling the cracks in your rockery or cottage garden walls.

Known for their bright flowers, viola petals are also edible, providing a vibrant addition to your late winter salads. A perfect flower for beginning and ending the growing season, sow your violas and overwinter in the greenhouse or cold frame for blooms from mid-February onwards.

Hellebore (Lenten rose)

Does your plot face the wrong way for full sun? The Lenten rose loves a shady spot and, even better, its elegant cup-shaped blooms bring winter colour that’s hard to beat. Blooms in white, pink, purple and red lend a vibrancy to even the most gloomy of garden corners.

Flowering from mid January through to mid March, Hellebores like a humus-rich soil so do remember to add plenty of well-rotted manure as required. Buy lenten roses as a bare root and plant straight into containers or borders.

Hyacinth

Enjoy winter colour indoors as well as out – hyacinths add striking blues, indigos, and whites to your planting. Grow yours in numbers to create broad brushstrokes of colour through your borders, or plant bulbs inside in bowls where their powerful scent brings a delightful perfume to your hallway, landing or living room.

Blooming from mid February outdoors, for indoor displays around Christmas time, plant hyacinths in potting compost with just the tip of the bulb showing. Place in a cold, dark corner, like the garage, for about six weeks, watering only sparingly before bringing indoors and positioning in a cool but bright spot.

Snowdrops

Nothing cheers the winter-weary heart more than the sight of tough little snowdrops defying the frost with their delicate white petals. Just when you’re beginning to doubt that the sun will ever return, around the base of barren trees you’ll find the first green shoots of these extraordinary little winter flowers.

Plant your snowdrops in swathes in autumn for a stunning display from January onwards. Favouring dappled shade over bright sun and moist, well drained soil over dry or boggy ground, create the ultimate in natural coverage by casting your bulbs over prepared soil and letting your snowdrops grow where they will.

There’s no need for your winter garden to be as gloomy as the weather. By choosing your winter bedding plants with care, you can be sure of colour that keeps on coming until the clocks go forward and spring has sprung.