Atlanta Garden Ideas

It starts tentatively, almost a game of hide and seek.  The fragrance of Lonicera fragrantissima is first out on an early February day.  Then a group of February Gold daffodils appear offering their shy but clear scent. In spite of winter’s polar vortex, by mid-March the aptly named Daphne odora is filling Ansley Park sidewalks with the rich scent that the makes the evening strollers swoon.

Bright and buxom Camellia japonicas lure me into the garden with heavy showy flowers that are essentially devoid of any olfactory allure.  It is the nearby hedge of Burford Holly that is drawing me and the bees closer with its unassuming, but sweetly scented flowers.   I often confuse the scent with Osmanthus fragrans.  I have both plants in my garden, and I am lured by both.   At my feet are late flowering Darwin Tulips with black stamens offering a distinctive and exclusive tulip fragrance.

By late March and early April the scents of spring in the garden are piling up like rush hour traffic southbound on I-85. It is the heady Viburnu burkwoodii that causes my first crash with Johnny jump ups, dianthus, late flowering daffodils with all their light fragrances stacking up, one on top of the other.  This is the time of year to get out of the traffic and the car.  Walk through your garden and neighborhood, or perhaps the Atlanta Botanical Garden and woods to take in the sweetly scented air that is a bit of what makes spring in Atlanta so special. 

If you want Atlanta garden ideas these are great inspirations, and they are what make these seasons differ so drastically from each other, even within our same great capital city of Georgia. And these are all great considerations for your own beautiful home garden! At Gardens to Love we have been lucky enough to take note of such magnificent plants and gardens in our work here in Atlanta over the years. Gardens and ideas are our business, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder – you!

Marcia Weber

 Read more on our experience and approach to landscape design and garden planning here in Atlanta, Georgia.