Lavender guide
Planting distances
Always a tricky subject, and it is of course desired effect and how long you can wait for your border edge or hedge to grow.
This is my very quick guide
Compact lavenders & dwarf lavenders
Varieties - hidcote, rosea, twinkle purple, lodden blue, little lottie
Generally these varieties will have a spread of around 25-30cm (30cm in ideal conditions) - so you will be looking at just over 3 per metre or 1 every foot.
Upright lavenders
Varieties - munstead, all the hybrids (edelweiss, grosso, provence, grappenhall)
These varieties all have potential to grow quite tall, so are larger plants in the long term - they all can be kept to a border edge size by hard trimming every autumn. Planting distance should be slightly further apart than compact varieties. It is worth cheacking spread on individual listings on the popular plants website. 3 per metre, or 1 every 16-18in would be ideal, but you could go further apart, although it would look sparce for the 1st year or so.
Larger lavenders
Varieties - Melissa Lilac, grey hedge and in some cases old english - so vera (dutch lavender clone)Big plants, with large spreads, and tall flowers - these can be spaced out quite far apart if you are just leaving to grow. Melissa lilac has a potential spread of up to 75cm - however would not recommend letting the plants grow that big - annual trimming recommended, as they look good as well kept small bushes. I would still be looking a 2 - 3 plants per metre, or 1 every 18inches - but it is to taste, and depends how big you want them to grow - a well kept lavender hedge will look tidy. The Old english varieties can be trimmed into nice mounds every autumn, and can be kept as almost topiary shapes - best variety for filling borders. The old english reaches it's potential size relatively quickly,so for instant effect this is the ideal variety.
more information will follow over the year - when it is a bit quieter.
Chris
www.popular-plants.co.uk
