Garden Book Review: Powerhouse Plants by Graham Rice

One shrub I wasn't expecting to see in Graham Rice's new book, Powerhouse Plants, was Forsythia. It's bright, it's cheerful, it flowers generously but, once the yellow stars have gone, it's very dull indeed. Or is it?

Powerhouse is the description used by Graham for plant varieties that offer interest at more that one point of the year; they might combine two (or even three or four) attributes such as interesting bark, winter stems, good foliage, flower, fruits, seasonal colour.

I've enjoyed Graham's books before - last year I reviewed his Planting the Dry Shade Garden - and this one doesn't disappoint. He draws attention to stages of plant growth that normally elicit no comment. In future, I shall think about the possibilities of emerging plants. As he says, "the fresh new growth on perennials as their shoots shoulder aside our mulch" can offer appealing and, in the case of something like the spear of Arisaema triphyllum (Jack-in-the-Pulpit), colourful and dramatic punctuation to the border.