Lots of lovely plants, bulbs and shrubs flower during the autumn and winter. Winter bedding plants like pansy, viola and bellis provide the easiest and quickest injection of colour into the garden in the colder months. They thrive in pots, window boxes and hanging baskets and are easy to move around the garden to wherever needs a bit of bright cheer. Autumn flowering bulbs like colchium and Nerine dowdenii ‘Isabel’ flower in late autumn, providing bright pink blooms that bridge the colour gap left between the end of summer flowering perennials and the start of winter bedding.
There are some lovely perennial plants that flower during the winter months. Hellebores return every year with winter blooms in startling shades of black, pink and deep purple. Crocus and snowdrop bulbs flower very early in the year outdoors, whereas hyacinth bulbs and paperwhites are lovely even earlier if forced to flower at Christmas time indoors, brightening the home and filling it with magical sweet scent.