Imagine stepping out your door and smelling your garden before you even see it. The multi-sensory joy that a fragrant flower garden offers to the gardener is unparalleled in the landscape. The key to having plenty of fragrant blooms – enough to bring inside by the armful to enjoy in vases – is making sure you’ve planned your fragrant flower garden to bloom from spring all the way into fall.
I’ll talk about some of my favorite fragrant varieties to plant for blooms all season long as well as tips for keeping your wonderful-smelling cut flowers last longer once you bring them indoors.
Designing A Fragrant Flower Garden: Blooms All Season Long
If you want to enjoy that spectacular scent of fragrant blooms all season long, you’ll want to make sure to add early, mid and late-season blooming varieties to your garden. This way you’ll not only have sweet fragrance, but color and interest in your garden from spring all the way into fall. Planning for season-long blooms is also the key to attracting pollinators to your fragrant garden. (Dual-purpose!)
Favorite Fragrant Flowers:
| Bloom Time | Common Name |
|---|---|
| Early Season | Hyacinths |
| Early Season | Peonies |
| Early Season | Dianthus |
| Early Season | Miniature Daffodils |
| Early Season | Bearded Iris |
| Early Season | Catmint |
| Mid Season | Viola |
| Mid Season | Bee Balm |
| Mid Season | Phlox |
| Mid Season | Freesia |
| Mid Season | Milkweed |
| Mid Season | Sweet Pea |
| Mid-Late Season | Lavender |
| Mid-Late Season | Daylilies |
| Mid-Late Season | Agastache |
| Mid-Late Season | Oriental Lilies |
| Mid-Late Season | Butterfly Bush |
Designing A Fragrant Flower Garden: Tips On Placing Plants
When designing your garden, make sure to put larger varieties towards the back of the garden if it is up against your home or a fence, or in the center if the garden is circular. Varieties that need deadheading to promote longer-lasting blooms (like Bee Balm) should be placed in an area that is easy to access. Before planting your perennials in the garden, make sure to measure the space needed between each plant so they have the best chance of success.
Designing An Easy, Fragrant Flower Garden: Get A Pre-Planned Garden!
Although designing and planting your own fragrant flower garden may sound like fun to you, if you’re a beginner gardener or too busy to take the time, our garden experts have designed one for you! The Fragrant Flower Garden is a collection of 26 fragrant perennials that create an easy, show-stopping statement in 72 sq feet. The garden comes with a complete plant list, planting instructions and three different planting maps to match your garden's layout.
Designing A Low Maintenance Fragrant Flower Garden: Fragrant Wildflower Mixture
If you’re looking for an even easier way to get color and fragrance all season long, our Fragrant Wildflower Mix is the perfect choice. With both annual and perennial varieties, this mixture will burst with blooms in the first year and for years to come. Bonus: you’ll not only have plenty of blooms to cut and bring indoors, but you’ll also enjoy a parade of pollinators to your garden or meadow from spring until fall.
Favorite Fragrant Combinations
How To Keep Flowers Fresh In A Vase:
- Cut in the early morning or late in the evening. Cooler temperatures make it easier on the cut flower to make the transition from growth to your vase.
- Choose blooms that are barely open. Flowers will open once put into water, so to ensure you’ll enjoy long-lasting color, cut flowers that have just opened or are about to open.
- Clean water. This is important! Clean, fresh water is important to keep your cut flowers lasting longer. Change the water every day if possible.
- The right temperature. Place your gorgeous bouquet in a cool area where it will last longer. Keep flowers away from hot windows or vents in the summer months.
Some of my favorite fragrant flowers to cut and bring indoors are Peonies, Oriental Lilies, Freesia and Hyacinths. These varieties all tend to last long in a vase.
After you’re done picking out your favorite fragrant varieties to add to your garden and finished planting, you get to the best part: enjoying your fragrant flower garden! Sit and drink a cup of coffee (or a cocktail), letting the colors and fragrance take over your senses. Read a good book on a blanket in the summer months or enjoy a warm drink on a bench by your garden in the fall. With a long-lasting, colorful and fragrant garden, the possibilities for enjoyment are endless.
