Orange Flowers

Posted on by Gillian

You may not be a fan of Orange but in August I think we need to see brighter colours in the garden. Pastel shades tend to look faded in the bright summer light. And orange is particularly good right now…

Some of my favourite easy to grow orange flowers are:

  • Annual Rudbeckia top row.
  • Annual Eschscholzia – middle row.
  • Orangey red Perennial Helenium – bottom row.

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Annual Rudbeckia plants are particularly easy to grow. Just sow the seeds in late spring and about 12 weeks later you’ll have flowers in your garden. There’s no point sowing too early because annual Rudbeckias need long days (about 14 hours of daylight) to initiate flowering. There’s a shade of orange for everyone. Annual varieties of Rudbeckia come in all shades of orange from pale golden orange, through eye watering bright orange to dark chocolate browny/orange. What’s more if you like plenty of flowers for cutting you’re onto a winner here. I can recommend these lovely plants.

I love bright colours and like to grow mine with contrasting plants. Purple or deep blue flowers such as Salvia viridis, Blue Larkspur or Cerinthe major make a nice strong contrast. If you prefer the paler shades of orange then you could grow them with white flowers such as Gypsophila or Cosmos to create a lighter brighter effect.

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Rudbeckias will flower well into autumn. I took these two photos on 30th September 2014. The plants had been in flower all summer and were still going strong. You can see that most of the other annual flowers had gone over, their flowers long gone and seed heads formed.

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I’m linking with Judith at Lavender Cottage today for Mosaic Monday.
Why not pop along to see what’s happening over there?

And I’ll definitely be growing more Rudbeckias next year!
Thanks for reading, liking and commenting on my blog posts. Have a lovely day. Gillian 🙂

 

22 thoughts on “Orange Flowers”

  2. The orange looks lovely in the garden! Beautiful flowers and images. Have a happy Monday and a great new week ahead!

  4. Your Rudbeckias are wonderful, orange or not. I actually am a fan of all colours in the garden but every season has its own favorite colours. I agree with you, for me orange is indeed one of the colours of August.

  5. I’m with you on the ORANGE…I have a whole area of orange, yellow and red dinnerplate dahlias. It’s a pride and joy. I always love your posts. Thank you for sharing your beautiful garden. My friends from the Netherlands, who are active photographers and bloggers, would agree with you on the orange. It is the country color!

  6. Beautiful photos. I love orange flowers, but don’t actually have any rudbeckia this year (after a couple of disappointing years of ‘Cherry Brandy’. However, you have inspired me to try again. Cheers.

    1. I grew five different Rudbeckias this year. Four were easy and thrived but Cherry Brandy didn’t grow for me either!

  7. I’m not a fan of orange flowers but by late summer into autumn I welcome the rudbeckias and garden mums in hues of gold and orange with a bit of burgundy in the mix.
    Thanks for linking to Mosaic Monday Gillian.

  10. I’ve gradually been coming to that conclusion. I had been a very ‘orange’ girl in a previous larger garden, but felt that a more pink, blue, purple garden would work in a smaller space. However I already have started a corner, and will soon be ordering my rudbekias for next year, and I think I shall try some Salvia Viridis too.

    1. Lovely. It’s true that bold colours like yellow, orange and red seem to advance towards you and draw the eye. You wouldn’t want to place them next to the dustbin! My feeling is that you should grow what you absolutely love rather than what you feel is right. It’s exciting planning a new garden isn’t it Noelle?

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