planting notes || Persicaria polymorpha

There is a lovely moment in late summer in our Stirlingshire garden when the flower heads of Persicaria polymorpha turn from creamy white to soft pink. It coincides with the deep pink flowering of Persicaria amplexicalulis and marks a beautiful colour shift in the perennial garden.

Earlier in the season this part of the planting has held a palette of whites in Astilbe 'Deutschland' and Astrantia 'Shaggy' but late summer brings a change that extends the planting with a whole new look and feel.

The handover is subtle.

First the Astilbe and Astrantia flowers peak and then fade whilst the deep, rich crimson Persicaria amplexicaulis and mottled, paler pink Persicaria amplexicaluis 'Roseum' start to bud up and open. And then, ever so quietly behind them the Persicaria polymorpha begins to switch.

At first a few flowers turn, but at a point almost impossible to pin down, the transformation is complete and we're gifted a wonderful colour movement from white to pink that adds a whole new layer to the planting scheme. And then, as if to say we are not done here yet, a bank of Selinum wallichianum open, their flat white umbel heads allowing the white back in again, their deep purple stems tying everything together.

It's the many moments like this which make planting design such a rewarding journey.

words: Lucy Head // images: Jason Russell