Cleome

It’s getting harder to find tall plants for the back of my annual borders as the shade continues its slow creep into our yard. Last summer I purchased a few cleome ‘Queen’ series plants and tucked them into the last row of some of my flowerbeds.

Like most annuals, cleome (spider flower) performs best in full sun, but my plants seemed quite satisfied in partial-shade and handled the drought and beastly temperatures with ease.

Queen cleome plants grow 4 feet tall with airy rose, violet and white flowers. They are heirloom plants that look especially fetching in a cottage garden.

I was tempted to sprout some of my own plants from seed this year, but laziness got the best of me. I’ll just pick up a few plants at the garden center again instead.