Plants with July Flowers – A Gardening Guide

It’s great to be spoilt for choice with July flowers and whilst there is absolutely nothing wrong with the more traditional flowering plants why not go for some exotic-looking and unusual flowering plants to give your garden a talking point?

July Flowering Tree:

To fill a large space there is nothing better than Liriodendron tulipifera (tulip tree), a beautifully distinctive large tree with big, flat, shiny, bright-green leaves. The giant orange and green flowers are tulip-shaped which look spectacular close-up but actually blend into the foliage from a distance. However, the foliage on this tree is lovely but it is really only suitable for large gardens as it can reach up to 30m tall. Although it is fast growing it will take around 25 years before the flowers appear.

July Flowering Shrub:

Philadelphus (mock orange) is a lovely, highly fragrant, fully hardy deciduous flowering shrub. On warm summer evenings the fragrance of orange-blossom can be appreciated to its fullest. This flowering shrub is also well-loved by bees. ‘Virginal’ is fairly fast growing, reaching a height and spread of 3m x 2m and is smothered with white flowers in June and July. ‘Belle Etoile’ has single white flowers and grows to around 1.2 m x 2.5 m. The smallest mock orange is ‘Manteau d’Hermine’, growing to around 75 cm x 1.5 m, and, again, smothered in white flowers in June and July. At least one of these fragrant shrubs is essential for a perfumed summer garden.

July Flowering Climber

There are so many varieties of rambling rose to choose from, each with their own characteristics – some fragrant, some not so. Rosa ‘Rambling Rector’ has a musky fragrance, often referred to as Shakespeare’s musk. It is fast growing and will reach a height and spread of around 6m – perfect for covering unsightly walls, fences and other structures. It looks spectacular when endowed with its creamy-white flowers in July and September and it grows pretty much anywhere, including those difficult north-facing walls.

July Flowers

For something exotic, why not try canna? They can be grown from rhizomes and dug up at the end of summer, overwintered somewhere cool and dry and planted the following season. They come in a variety of sizes, foliage and flower colours and they will flower all summer long until the first frost.

For lovely fluffy plumes Astilbe (false goatsbeard) is a must. They are vigorous growers and the plumes appear from mounds of delicate dark-green and bronze leaves. The July flowering varieties come in white and a vivid pink and are around 1m tall. There is a smaller, red variety (around 60 cm) height but it flowers slightly earlier in June. See this article for other Plants with June Flowers.

One of the mainstays of any summer border has to be Echinacea (coneflower). Its long-lasting flowers come in a variety of colours and will suit almost any style. ‘Tomato Soup’ with its bright red flowers up to 12 cm across, ‘Vintage Wine’ with its deep pink flowers and ‘Hot Summer’ which changes colour from gold, through to orange and finally deep red are all particularly effective in a sunny border.

What summer garden is not complete without the daisy-like flowers of the gerbera? Whilst there are a myriad of annual varieties it is little known that the Gerbera Everlast series are perennials. Although they are frost-hardy they may need to be dug up and over-wintered if the weather dips below 0 C for any prolonged period.

There are many other spectacular July flowers which will complement these beautifully. Experiment and have fun with different combinations. You may want to have a look at the article Plants with August Flowers – A Gardening Guide for some more ideas.