‘It’s Fall, y’all,’ and that’s your cue to swap your heat-loving annuals for something cooler. Summer blooms start to look tired, and that’s when you know it’s time for a transition. Now is a great time to put together cold-tolerant container arrangements! Think of this as the final send-off of your outdoor gardening this year, a chance to add life to your porch, patio, or business entrance with colors and textures that counter the dull, dead colors of late fall and winter.
Did you know that fall is the best planting season because the cooler temperatures allow plants to focus their energy on establishing root systems without the stress of heat? Essentially, you’re giving your plants a head start for next spring. Pansies and violas work great for containers because they can last so much longer than other annuals and are durable enough to withstand the frost and freezes. Pansies and violas offer flower “faces” that hold up throughout the fall and winter, providing a nice transition from summer annuals like Petunias, Geraniums, or Zinnias. They’ll often keep growing in the spring and continue growing until it gets hot again!
To create some contrasting textures, we recommend layering your arrangements with crisp, architectural-type foliage. Think about the cool colors of Ornamental Kale and Cabbage, or Swiss Chard. It all depends on the look or color scheme you want to show, but believe me, these all play well together in a container!
To take your container from “nice” to “wow,” use a professional landscaping secret: the “Thriller, Filler, and Spiller” Method. It’s the easiest technique in gardening. The technique will draw the viewer’s eye up, out, and over. Container gardening is all about depth and dimension and playing with variables to create an interesting display.
- The Thriller (The Statement Plant)
- Placement: Add your Thrillers to the center (for a container viewed from all sides) or the back (for a container against a wall).
- Purpose: They are the stars of the show, providing height, structure, and color that is sure to turn heads!
- Great Choices: Ornamental Grasses, Ornamental Kale, small evergreen potted shrubs or trees like an Emerald Green Arborvitae or Green Giant.
- The Filler (The Body)
- Placement: Next, tuck in your Filler plants around your Thriller plant.
- Purpose: These plants will have a more mounding, dense habit. They provide volume and a cohesive mid-layer, making the arrangement look full.
- Great Choices: Group plantings of Pansies, and Violas, or even the beautiful, dense foliage of Swiss Chard or other cool weather vegetables like Spinach.
- The Spiller (The Finishing Touch)
- Placement: Last but not least, plant your Spillers right along the edges of the container.
- Purpose: These are the cascading plants that grow over the container’s edge, softening the display and creating a sense of movement and abundance. They will truly finish the container off.
- Great Choices: Trailing plants like Creeping Jenny or even trailing Wave Pansies do well for the cold season.
The Final Steps
Once your container is planted, here’s the easy part:
- Water deeply: Give your newly planted containers a thorough watering to wash out any air pockets. The roots need a good, soaking drink to settle into their new home.
- Maintain: Water every few days, checking the soil moisture with your finger. If the top inch is dry or showing cracks in the soil around the edges, it’s a good time to water!
- Feed: Fertilize the containers with a timed release fertilizer, such as osmocote, in fall and again late February or early March. Nutrients wash out of containers overtime, be sure not to skip this step.
With this simple care routine, these containers should last all season long. If you want to create a quick display, we have some wonderful containers to choose from that are already planted with this method in mind.
