I keep leafing through a few special nursery catalogs, contemplating a purple cauliflower here and green kniphofia there. I get nearly as much pleasure from the plants on the page as from the plants growing in my garden...perhaps more so because the plants in the catalogs are pure potential.
Just as with magazines and newspapers, it's so satisfying to hold a paper nursery catalog in hand. I admit I search out plants online all the time, but turning pages, marking favorites, and flipping back and forth between possibilities is much easier and more fun than clicking around. I get so much better sense of the plants, the nursery and the people behind both with a catalog in hand than on a computer screen.
So here's what is in the pile right here on my coffee table:
Annie's Annuals and Perennials offers such a tantalizing selection of unusual plants...Annie gives lots of commentary ("How to Have a Fabby Garden....") and the catalog is packed with color photos...from a ruffly pink double cosmos called 'Prom Dress' to the fragrant heirloom orange sweet pea 'Henry Eckford', Annie's offerings are irresistible... be sure and check out the poppies, like 'Black Swan' (left) which is dark purple and so double it's positively shaggy, or Papaver 'Drama Queen' with ruby red flowers that look like mini-petal-explosions....
Also free and in print: White Flower Farm, B&D Lilies, and the full-time-job of a fabulous catalog from Plant Delights Nursery. I don't know about you, but I may as well just endorse my paycheck over to this nursery, for it has the best assortment of hostas and the coolest hardy succulents you'll find anywhere...
