Hello and welcome back to my blog! As mentioned in my last post, today’s post shows you the main project I have been working on in The Wild Borders this year.
This is a longer post today – grab a hot drink before you start reading. Enjoy 🙂
Table of contents
- Table of contents
- Brief overview of The Wild Borders
- Work undertaken so far in 2025
- Other plans
- Conclusion
Brief overview of The Wild Borders
You’ll recall if you read my blog posts, that The Wild Borders have been one of the nooks in my garden that I have been working on for the past two years.
If you are a newer reader to my blog, you may enjoy reading this post, which gives a much more detailed introduction of The Wild Borders, looking back to 2022.
The Wild Borders is made up of a left-side border and a right-side border, both of which are accessible by a small set of stairs in the middle.
Most of the work undertaken last year in The Wild Borders took place in the left-side border:
Since November 2024, I turned my attention to starting work on the right-side border, to help link the two borders together with styling and planting.
As a quick reminder, here is how the area has looked over the years:
Starting work in December 2024
Back in December 2024, I left the right-side border like this, after removing overgrown/unwanted planting and mulching the bed:
Work undertaken so far in 2025
January 2025
In January 2025, the Mr and I installed another arch, to repeat the arch walkway we installed in the left-side border:
February and March 2025
More recently, in February and now at the beginning of March, I’ve added another seating area and started adding new planting to the border:
The new seating area
I had actually intended for the arched seat to be positioned diagonally in the border, but one of my main motivations for making a seating area was to create an area to sit and enjoy the view of the hills beyond and the sunset from that area of the garden:
I realised after constructing the seat, that the original plan to position the seat diagonally would mean you couldn’t see the sunset, so I adapted my plan to place it against the back wall.
New planting: roses and trees
Climbing rose: ‘The Generous Gardener’
New planting in the right-side of The Wild Borders has included a new climbing rose called ‘The Generous Gardener’:
This rose is going to climb up and over the arched seat and up the back wall:
Bush rose: ‘Sweet Honey’
The next rose that is ‘new’ to this border is a bush rose, which won rose of the year in 2020, called ‘Sweet Honey’. I purchased this rose from the RHS Tatton Flower Show a number of years ago now, initially keeping it in a large pot.
I moved this rose from the bed that edges the pathway up to the borders. I plan on growing dahlias in that bed this year 🙂
The ‘Sweet Honey’ rose is better placed up on the higher bed because it should mean you won’t catch yourself on it whilst walking by and you will also be able to admire it from the new seating area.
The flowers from this rose are really beautiful:
The flowers of this rose start off as a soft apricot colour and as they bloom and open, the colour fades to a delicate peachy pink. I am going to see how this rose look here with the other colours in this border; it can always be moved in Autumn to The Suntrap, where it may blend in better…
Two new trees
I then added two new small trees to the right-side border:
Prunus mume ‘Beni-chidori’ (Ornamental Japanese Apricot)
The flowers on this tree are beautiful and highly fragranced:
Prunus pendulus ‘Ascendens Rosea’ (weeping ascending ornamental cherry)
This tree will blossom in a few weeks. You can see when looking at the tree close up, it has decorative peeling bark, which should make a beautiful statement as the tree matures.
Both trees were challenging to photograph, but as they leaf out they should become easier to see. I will provide an update on my blog in the coming months as both trees grow.
Both of these trees have been planted next to the bird feeders and they should eventually be mature enough to hold the feeders. The birds in our garden have already taken to perching on the trees before going to the feeders.
The trees have also been planted so that they can be viewed from our living room window and they will provide privacy as they mature.
I will be uploading posts soon as part of my ‘Plant in Focus’ series, where I will look at each tree in much closer detail. Stay tuned for those posts 🙂
Other plans
The edge of the pergola in The Honeysuckle Nook, which is our main seating area right outside the back door, will need to continue to be trained to grow over the side of the pergola. This structure edges the side of the right-side border, as pictured below. That view will look very different over time once the honeysuckle has fully grown in and covered the side. The planting in front of it should stand out more once the backdrop of honeysuckle has established:
I have added a photo below to help you imagine what I am planning. The photo below shows the righthand side of the pergola, where I began training the honeysuckle and rambling rose to grow up over the side and the top of the pergola last year. Even now, it gives a great cocooning feeling to the space:
Eventually, I am aiming for the pergola to be completely covered on both sides with the honeysuckle and rambling rose 🙂
Conclusion
If you made it to the end of this post, I hope you enjoyed following along and seeing what I have been getting up to. There is still a way to go and I have many other plans for The Wild Borders this year; I cannot wait to see how the new planting grows over the next year!
I am going to start on a variety of bulb planting soon, which I will share with you in my next post. Until next time, happy gardening 🙂
The Charming Nook 
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