A Winter Garden
At Twombly Nursery in Monroe, Connecticut, owner Ken Twombly and his staff have created a winter garden. Nursery sales manager Jay Nathans explains that “the basic philosophy that underpins the winter garden is combining five elements—color, texture, form, berries, and fruit—with flowers, so that there are many things to see.”
The blues, yellows, and greens of a wide variety of conifers make an important contribution to the color palate. (There’s hardly a conifer that doesn’t have a color in its name). So do the brilliant reds of the Beni Kawa Japanese maple (Acer palmatum ‘Beni Kawa’), the red twig dogwood (Cornus sericea ‘Cardinal’), and bloodtwig dogwood (Comus sanguinea ‘Winter Beauty’).
Lower to the ground,shrubs like heaths (Erica) and heathers (Calluna uulgaris) contribute to the garden’s wonderful color array.One of the great opportunities of a winter garden is the chance to notice the textures: textures of bark, such as the paperbark maple (Acer griseum) and lacebark pine (Pinus bungeana), and textures of foliage, such as ornamental grasses and evergreen perennials. The form of plants also becomes more apparent in winter, so the Twombly garden features a number of weeping trees as well as Harry Lauder’s walking stick (Corylus avellana ‘Contorta’) with its fabulous contorted branches.
Plants with berries or fruits that persist through the winter include a number of winterberries (Gaultheria), as well as crabapples (Malus). Blooming plants are represented by, among others, privet honeysuckle (Lonicera pilieta) and winter-hazel (Corylopsis).
“I can honestly say there’s something blooming all year,” says Nathans.