Container combos: so two seasons ago?

Could be, but I still like mixing plants in containers. I am very tempted and intrigued by the idea of having a group of containers, each planted with a single plant. The pots would interact with each other, rather than the interaction taking place within each pot.

But I never do it. In fact, this season I was supposed to experiment with monochromatic containers and I forgot about that, too. I may have one white one.

In any case, here are my two favorite combos at the moment. Perhaps just two plants within a container are all that’s needed, as long as the contrast is dramatic enough. At top you see a rather homey duo: diascia and lobelia. Yeah, pink and blue—how corny can you get. But the diascia is really a deep rose and the lobelia is as blue as a plant gets, so it works for me. (The camera has washed them out a bit.)


Then, above—though it’s early days for this basket—you have the classic (and classy) match of sweet potato vine with purple wave petunia. This petunia really does look too blue—sorry, my camera, the light, something.

I have a bunch of other containers that largely depend on tallish plants like elephant ear and canna, with other plants clustering about. Sadly, some plants have already failed, and the major elements have yet to show their stuff. In a week or so, I’ll have something worth posting about. Or not.