On Mon, 11 May 2009 15:50:48 +0100, Sacha wrote:

Sorry Bob but where do you live? Climate conditions will make a
difference to suggestions given. My apologies if you've already told
us that and I've missed it! I see some ferns in there so is it a
shady spot or is it mainly sun or half and half. Which way does it
face? Is it under a window and if not, why does height have to be
restricted to 1m?
A quick suggestion would be for Sarcoccas to give intense winter scent
and they get to about 1m. Some of the shrubby Clematis might be nice
for you, too. Hardy Fuchsias, perhaps? Grasses have a nice 'airy' and
flowing feel to them. Personally, I'd avoid roses because it seems as
if you'd be looking at bare twigs for most of the year. Can you pave
the gravel area and perhaps get some water into the middle of it? And
if you can, leave some square gaps between the paving stones and plant
low-growing herbs like thyme and lemon balm in there for colour, scent
and informality. If the gravel is laid on a membrane, you *might* be
able to do that by cutting holes in the membrane and sticking plants in
- it does rather depend on how good, or bad, the soil is under the
gravel. You can underplant with little bulbs like the beautiful little
Narcissus Tete a Tete.

I'm in a Normandy town, so similar weather to the south of UK although
I always suspect a couple of degrees more extreme at both ends.

Thanks for all your suggestions, Sacha, I'll be hovering over the full
range of them at the garden centre when next in the UK. I find scope
for confusion with the centres here, and usually it's pricier.

This pic should explain all:-

http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/v...DSCF2070ps.jpg

So it's a corridor formed by the wall at the left, the house on the
right and the plot in question bang in the middle. This pic is taken
just as you come out of the kitchen and with table and chairs here too
it's the main vantage point. Of course, when sitting, you'll see even
less, hence the concern about height.

The corridor points south so plenty of sunshine at the further end and
maybe 4-5 hours at best at this end, though always bright.

I like the idea of the grasses. There are already 3 roses (sorry,
total ignoramus here - shrubby and grafted on to a 3 cm trunk) and I
take your point about twiggyness. The tallest plants are the rose in
the middle and stellatas at each end chopped to within an inch of
their lives. I'd thought of letting the stellatas go but I don't
think that could make any sense given the layout here.

I'm not at all happy with the gravel/raised bed/rocky border but am
disinclined to change that for the moment particularly since beyond a
drastic/expensive alteration there's not much I can do about the
concrete flag path visible on the right and which is immediately
adjacent to the house.

There are a few azaleas obscured by the rose and furthest stellata so
the whole thing looks unremittingly green but there should be some new
colour soon (honest!)