About this box
Dark flowers are the secret behind most of the borders and bouquets people stop to look at. A near-black cornflower or a wine-dark scabious makes every colour beside it look brighter, and a bunch with a few dark stems in it looks considered rather than simply pretty. The Midnight Garden Collection gathers ten of the darkest flowers we grow, from velvet crimson to almost black.
There is something for every part of the border. Hollyhock Blackberry sends wine-purple spires up past two metres, Sweet Pea Black Knight climbs with deep maroon flowers and the old-fashioned scent it has carried since 1898, and Sunflower Chocolate gives mahogany petals round a dark disc. Through the middle run Cornflower Black Ball, Scabious Black Knight, the claret pincushions of Scabiosa Beaujolais Bonnets and the ruffled near-black Poppy Black Peony. Daucus Carota Dara adds lace that opens pink and deepens to chocolate, Antirrhinum Black Prince brings velvet crimson snapdragons over bronze leaves, and Aquilegia William Guinness, the 'Magpie' columbine, opens purple-black edged in white in late spring.
Six annuals flower the first summer, two biennials follow the next year, and two perennials come back for years. The poppy and Dara seed heads are worth leaving for drying too.
Getting the best from dark flowers
Dark flowers need light behind or around them. Plant them where the sun catches them low in the morning or evening, or against silver, lime or white, and they glow like stained glass. In deep shade or against a dark fence they disappear. They also pair beautifully with white, which is why we put together The Moonlight Garden Collection as a companion box.
Full instructions are printed on every packet. Ten full-sized packets in our signature eco-friendly packaging – a striking gift for a gardener who already has the pastels covered.
