GPOD on the Road: Keukenhof, Part 2

03.05.2024 - 14:12 / finegardening.com / GPOD Contributor

We’re back today with photos that Marilyn Regnier shared with us of her once-in-a-lifetime trip to see the famous Keukenhof spring flower-bulb displays. The park in Lisse, Netherlands, shows off millions of bulbs each spring, with displays that are both over the top and full of ideas you can take home—on a smaller scale—to your own garden.

White and yellow tulips are always beautiful, but the colors just seem to grow in a shaded woodland setting. At Keukenhof, the bulbs are dug up after bloom and fresh ones are planted each year, so they don’t have to worry about the tulips perennializing. At home, tulips can also be treated like annuals, especially if you garden in a warm climate, but you can get them to come back year after year by planting them in full sun, giving them good drainage, and choosing varieties like the Darwin hybrids that are better adapted to life in the garden.

Abstract sculptures dotted throughout the park provide an accent to the incredible floral displays.

Now this is a color scheme worth stealing and recreating at home—whites, pinks, warm melon shades, and just a hint of purple. It all works together beautifully.

For a fiery, attention-grabbing combination, nothing beats yellow and red.

A softer shade of orange combined with yellow makes for a somewhat calmer feeling.

Most of the beds are Keuklenhof are just one variety grown in a mass, but here are daffodils, tulips, and fritillaria. Making a combo like this work depends on getting the timing right so that everything blooms together, and being careful on color choices. You’ll notice that all the daffodils are whites and soft, pastel yellows, which combine nicely with the more pastel shades of most of the tulips.

Pink and lavender together work so