Margot’s Winter Garden – FineGardening

Today we’re off to Washington State to visit with Margot Navarre.

I live in Bellevue, Washington, and wanted to share a few pictures of my winter garden. I am a year-round home gardener and work part-time in estate gardens. I also walk dogs and sell wine. I have found a way to get paid for all the things I enjoy. I adore the snowdrops, cyclamens, and spring ephemerals. My front garden is full of little treasures; we have a woodland garden in the back of the house that has year-round interest and is home to many birds and native plants.

Snowdrops (Galanthus, Zones 3–7) blooms in front of a carpet of Cyclamen hederifolium (ivy-leaved cyclamen, Zones 5–9). This hardy cyclamen blooms in the fall and then shows off beautiful silver-and-green-patterned foliage all through the winter and spring before going dormant for the summer.

Cyclamen coum (winter cyclamen, Zones 5–8) has beautiful leaves as well, and it blooms in late winter to early spring. Leaves range from solid silver to complex patterns of silver and green, and flowers range from white to dark pink. Here, two plants show off in a container so you can easily get up close to appreciate the detail of their foliage and flowers.

Cyclamen coum is joined by a clump of early crocuses (Crocus tommasinianus, Zones 3–8) to make a colorful display in early spring.

Another cluster of crocuses is showing off, with the smaller but abundant blooms of Crocus tommasinianus mixing with the larger flowers of Crocus vernus (Zones 3–8). Both are essential flowers of any early spring garden as long as you can keep the squirrels and other rodents from feasting on their bulbs.

In the garden in early spring, snowdrops and crocuses are flowering, and clumps of primroses (Primula hybrids, Zones 3–7) are loaded up with flower buds about to burst into bloom.

Snowdrops and cyclamen are backed up by another stalwart of the late-winter/early spring garden—hellebores (Helleborus hybrids, Zones 4–9).

Snowdrop lovers collect special varieties with particularly showy flowers or beautiful patterns. This is the variety ‘Big Eyes’ (Galanthus ‘Big Eyes’, Zones 3–7), which is a hybrid selected for the large flowers and named for the little face the green pattern on the inner petals makes.

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