Re: Color emphases on Perennial border design

At 07:25 AM 1/16/98 -0800, McAlpine, Duncan G wrote:
>This might of been a good subject to catch your eye, but I would like to
>add a new thread to the list.  As you know, we all join this mailing
>list to learn more about perennials and their companion plants.   The
>main concern to me is understanding the relationship of colors in the
>perennial border.
[snip]
>Now, I have read and if my memory is correct, do you place opposite
>colors next to each other or I am totally of base and you need to align
>your plant colors in relationship to the color spectrum?


To Jean Carpenter's reply in another post, let me add another book
recommendation, Andrew Lawson's _The Gardener's Book of Colour_. It's
probably at your public library, if you don't want to buy it. I've learned
a lot from it.

The colour wheel has red opposite green, orange opposite (true) blue, and
yellow opposite violet (often called blue in plant descriptions). You can
fill in the transitional shades: bluish-red opposite yellow-green, warm red
opposite blue-green, and so on.

The reason why the opposites or complementaries on the colour wheel look so
good next to each other is that the eye is constantly affected by what it
has just seen. If you stare, say, at something red, the cones in the retina
that perceive red get tired, and the retina starts to perceive non-red,
i.e. the complementary colour green. So when you actually look at something
green, the colour appears especially vivid. Same thing in reverse. Neat, eh?

Neighbouring colours on the wheel look good next to each other because they
harmonize, they share characteristics and (speaking subjectively here) set
up a sort of resonance in the eye like two related musical tones. In
general, there are 'cool' harmonies (green-blue-violet-purple) and 'warm'
ones (red-orange-yellow). Grey, blue and white-variegated foliage tends to
be cool. Bronze and lime-green foliage are more on the warm side.

The colour schemes that tend to set people's teeth on edge are the ones
that are neither complementary nor harmonious: say, rose and orange, or
scarlet and violet. Jean (to whom this will be old hat) gave an example
with orange and pink azaleas. Another one is your all-too-typical
institutional planting with pink petunias and golden-yellow marigolds.
It's not for everybody, but a way you can make this disharmony work,
according to Lawson, is by intentionally creating a colour 'shock' between
two clashing colours of similar intensity: say, brilliant magenta and
brilliant orange, or yellow and bright purplish-red. In small doses it can
be striking - rather tropical.

Question: what companion perennials have you found that really pull your
designs together? I mean the sort of third-party peacemakers that let you
keep clashing plants together in the same bed. The foliage plants come to
mind, or white, pale yellow and green flowers. Anyone have some nice examples?

Linda in Winnipeg, zone 3
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