Five simple flower arrangements for high summer | House & Garden

Well, it's been a few years and our DIY bicycle mailbox was ready for a makeover. This time around we added a DIY walkway under it to avoid having to weed whack around it. So this tutorial is mainly explaining how we put a walkway under it.

With their unique, climbing habit, vines are the perfect plants for adding vertical interest with bright summer colors to the garden.Most are fast growing, and their clinging o

No matter the time of year, freshly cut flowers will always bring a sense of joy and natural beauty into any room. Fresh bouquets in water — whether grown ourselves or gifted — are normally at their best for a couple of weeks, but blooms will be fleeting and are usually thrown away once they start to lose their colour and wilt. So, a question that I’m asked a lot is simply — ‘How can I make my flowers last longer?’ The answer lies in the art of drying flowers — a craft that I’ve been immersed in for the past seven years. Dried floral arrangements will bring a different aesthetic to interiors compared to fresh — they are not for everyone — but if you like the look, you can very easily prolong the beauty of your flowers by months — even years — by creating striking arrangements that celebrate floral structures and will add interest to mantelpieces, dining tables, sideboards — you name it — throughout the seasons.

Deservedly one of the most popular houseplants in the UK, the peace lily (Spathiphyllum wallisii) is relatively easy to grow and, in good condition, always looks elegant. Above a mass of large, glossy evergreen leaves that stand tall and proud, the plant intermittently sends up white arrow-shaped spathes. These petal-like bracts, which can be 15-centimetres long and resemble the sails of a ship, are not flowers, but encase the flowers proper, which are held on a spike known as a spadix. In bloom, the peace lily is reminiscent of the arum lily and our native lords-and-ladies (sometimes known as lily grass or jack-in-the-pulpit), which also belong to the arum family (Araceae); none are true lilies (Lilium).

Iris ‘Benton Olive’ in Sarah Price's garden

Air plants (Tillandsia) earn their name by being capable of growing without soil. In their native habitat of Central and South America, they cling to trees, cliffs, roofs, and telephone wires with their roots and absorb nutrients from the air. Their grey-green foliage is coated in a silvery frosting of water-absorbing hairs called trichomes; these are capable of taking moisture from the atmosphere, especially in rainy or misty conditions.

Harry's Chelsea garden, The School Food Matters Garden

A garden with a restrained planting palette can be so exciting and atmospheric. Nowhere is this more true than in the case of the white garden. The limitations of choosing plants of a single colour means you can focus your attention; in fact there are so many plants out there that if you don’t have some sort of guiding principles when you set about designing your garden, you will soon be lost and overwhelmed with options.

The gardens at Great Dixter.

In the well-to-do town of Bedford, New York, there are a few givens: there are apple orchards and quaint bed and breakfasts, cute bakeries and amazing antiques shops and, of course, many grand estates complete with rolling green lawns and well-hedged gardens. Perhaps most impressive of the latter belongs to the doyenne of the domestic, Martha Stewart.

An English summer can be a temperamental one; days of scorching rays that could melt candle wax, followed by lashings of rain and cool evenings. A summer house is the perfect sanctuary to retreat to for both relaxing and entertaining whatever the weather. A place to observe the humming life of the garden, to watch the peonies burst forth, the roses bloom and clematis stretch open their long petals. Versatility and comfort must be at the forefront of any summer house decoration, but it’s the tasteful, thoughtful and unique touches that will make you return again and again to this multi-purpose space.

These Fragrant Climbers are all you need to cover the bland walls around your home and garden with style!