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If you love old-fashioned flowers, plant a cottage garden! Originally, cottage gardens evolved from English country gardens, which were designed to be productive spaces where herbs, vegetables, summer flowers, and even livestock intermingled. Today's cottage gardens reflect that history with a relaxed, peaceful style that's just as appealing now as it was historically.
Cottage gardens become more popular in recent years, perhaps because we're all yearning for a sense of nostalgia. When filled with old-fashioned flowers like roses and peonies, they may remind you of your grandma's garden. Classic landscaping ideas that feature winding pathways, rose-covered arbors, and white picket fences are the epitome of romance. Best of all, many cottage garden flowers are sturdy and easy to grow, both from seeds and seedlings. There are also many perennial flowers that come back year after year, helping to attract pollinators like hummingbirds and bees.
Whether you live in an urban setting or have a large rambling yard, you can incorporate elements of the cottage garden in your own garden. Focus on combining colors, textures, and fragrances you truly love from rambling roses to stately hollyhocks and even scented lavender. Even a container or window box will work—there are no rules! Recreate this style and feel at home in an old-fashioned English garden of your own with our favorite cottage flowers.
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Foxglove
Foxglove is another quintessential cottage garden favorite. The tall spikes of tubular flowers on these perennials make a striking accent in borders. Ranging from cream to pink in color, these tubular flowers attract hummingbirds.
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Delphinium
Also called larkspur, these gorgeous cobalt blue flowers tower up to 6 feet tall above the rest of the garden with stately spikes of flowers in late spring to early summer. Deer tend to ignore this perennial, so it's a good deer-resistant plant. New cultivars, or cultivated varieties, include shorter types, as well as pink, white, or lavender flowers.
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Phlox
The delicate fragrance and bright colors of this cottage garden favorite make it welcome in garden beds of all sizes. This perennial blooms for weeks, attracting pollinators such as hummingbirds. New cultivars are more mildew resistant.
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Catmint
As far as perennials go, it doesn't get much tougher than catmint. It will tolerate most soil types and is drought-tolerant once established. The silvery leaves with a minty-spicy scent and delicate spikes of purple flowers are beautiful in mixed borders or when planted in masses. Pollinators of all sorts adore catmint.
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Ammi
Ammi resemble the roadside weed, Queen Anne's lace, but aren't as aggressive. Their wispy blooms look like lace, blooming profusely in mid to late summer. There are pink and white varieties, and they’re easy to grow from seed. But they do have a long time to maturity, so start seeds indoors in cold climates.
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Hollyhock
These cottage garden perennials have tall stems with multiple flowers from spring to summer in shades of peach, pink, lilac, or white. They'll also self-sow readily.
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Perennial Herb
Many perennial herbs have attractive forms and lovely flowers that pollinators adore. Plant favorites such as sage, thyme, and chives, but add some lesser-known types, such as lovage, which has a celery-like flavor, and borage (shown here), which has pretty blue flowers that resemble nigella.
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Rose
Every garden needs roses and roses aren't as fussy as you think. Many different types, including climbing and rambling roses, look at home in a cottage garden setting, where they can spill over fences or arbors. Shrub roses are some of the most carefree types and will bloom from early summer to frost.
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Hardy Geranium
Also called cranesbill, due to the shape of the tiny flowers, this sturdy perennial is extremely cold-hardy and spreads rapidly. Some cultivars bloom in late spring, while others will bloom all summer long. They make an excellent low-maintenance ground cover, and pollinators love these pretty plants.
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Four O'Clock
These pretty tubular flowers come in many colors and bloom around 4 o'clock in the afternoon, closing up the next morning. They're technically a perennial but act more like annuals in most of the country. They also are super-easy to grow from seed and will self-sow and pop up again next year.
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Peony
Peonies are the queens of the springtime garden. Their lush, full flowers appear in late spring, filling the garden with fragrance. There are many different types, but they're all worth adding to your perennial beds. Peonies are long-living plants that can live for up to 100 years!
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Lavender
This stunning perennial has silvery foliage and beautiful spikes of purple or pink flowers. English lavender and lavandin, a hybrid that's more heat and cold tolerant, are reliable types to grow if you have cold winters. In hot and humid areas of the country, Spanish lavender, with its tufted flowers, tends to do better.
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Love in a Mist
Also called nigella, this lovely annual is worth growing just for the name! But the starry, exotic-looking blooms and feathery foliage are another reason you should add this one to your garden. Chances are, you'll need to purchase and grow from seed because you'll almost never see this one in garden centers. But it's actually easy to grow from seed and will self-sow to pop up again next year if conditions are right.
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Campanula
Also called bellflower, this beautiful blue flower are long-blooming and favorites of hummingbirds. This perennial also makes a lovely cut flower, and it also self-sows to make new plants. Some cultivars are pale blue, white or pale pink.
