Growing Perennials

It’s tough, it’s pretty, bees like the flowers, it grows practically anywhere, and it stays green in the heat of summer when turf grass has turned crispy.

 If you want to grow your own coleus from seed, here are some cultivars to try.

The elegant purple-blue flowers of this native iris are a pretty sight in spring, and they are—but even better are the long, tapered, swordlike leaves, which last until fall.

Add color with these popular summer-blooming perennials, all of which are recommended as the best bee-balm cultivars by the Chicago Botanic Garden.

Many perennials are short lived, but here are options to keep color in your garden a bit longer.

Lilacs explode with perfume and blossoms in May. The tresses of purple blossoms are a perfect symbol of spring’s promise.

For years I ignored salad burnet in my mother’s garden. The dainty, toothed leaflets caught my attention, but I thought it was rather a waste of space: small and monochromatic with an odd, sparse little flower, when there was a flower at all. Then one day I tasted it...

There are a lot of reasons to love liverwort. It’s tough and dependable. It’s a discreet, low-maintenance beauty. It’s one of the earliest spring flowers, raising its ethereal stems and tiny blossoms in March or April.

Old-fashioned and easy to grow, columbines are a long-time garden favorite.

Boasting cheery, daisy-like yellow flowers, coreopsis brings sunny color to the summer garden.