Dicentra ‘GoldHeart’

Hosta ‘Golden Scepter’

From brilliant green to rich gold hues, fabulous foliage and flowers can wake up any dark or colorless, shade area. See below a list of great plants that wake up a blah area of your shade garden. Plant list is suitable for gardens in plant hardiness zones 5-8. Exciting colorful and/or tropical-like foliage or showy flowers.

Hostas, coral bells and liriopes are the first plants that gardeners think of and there are many cultivars to select from. A number of gold colored plants such as variegated liriope, ‘Sun King’ aralia, and many gold and variegated leaf hostas. Some variegated shrubs include ‘Brigadoon’ St. John’s wort, boxwood (Buxus), ‘Girard’s Rainbow’ doghobble (Leucothoe), and variegated forms of euonymus. They add a splash of foliage color, provided that they receive a minimum of  2-3 hours of dappled sunlight.

Plant suggestions:

• Golden Japanese forest grass (Hakonechloa macra ‘Aureola’, ‘All Gold’)
• Golden sweet flag (Acorus gramineus ‘Ogon’)
• ‘Evergold’ or ‘Evercolor’ sedges (Carex oshimensis)
• Gold Heart Bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis ‘Gold Heart’)*
• Creeping liriope, monkeygrass (Liriope spicata ‘Variegata’)
• Lilyturf liriope (Liriope muscari ‘Peedee Ingot’)*
• Sun King aralia (Aralia cordata ‘Sun King’)*
• Black mondo grass (Ophiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’)
• Gold leaf hostas (Hosta ‘Golden Tiara’, ‘Golden Scepter’, ‘August Moon’, others)
• Variegated forms of hostas (Hosta ‘Patriot’, ‘Gold Standard’, ‘Francee’, others)
• Autumn fern (Athyrium erythrosora)
• Lungworts (Pulmonaria x ‘Miss Moon’, ‘Raspberry Splash’, ‘Dark Vader’, ‘Trevi Fountain’
• Variegated Solomon Seal (Polygonatum odoratum ‘Variegatum’)
• Ligularias (Ligularia dentata ‘Britt-Marie Crawford’)
• Heart shaped brunneras (Brunnera macrophylla ’Jack Frost’, ‘Sea Heart’, ‘Looking Glass’)
  

  Hypericum Brigadoon’

• Brick red leaf rodgersia (Rodgersia podophylla ‘Rotlaub’)
• Foam flowers (Tiarella x ‘Spring Symphony’, ‘Iron Butterfly’, ‘Mystic Mist’)
• Colorful coral bells (Heuchera ‘Caramel’, ‘Southern Comfort’, ‘Citronelle’, ‘Georgia Peach’)
• Various heucherellas (Heucherella x ‘Sweet Tea’, ‘Stoplight’)
• Variegated boxwood (Buxus sempervirens ‘Elegantissima’)
• Moonshadow wintercreeper (Euonymus x ‘Moonshadow’)
• Golden St. John’s wort (Hypericum calycinum ‘Brigadoon’)*
• Spotty Dotty Chinese mayapple (Podophyllum ‘Spotty Dotty’)

*2-3 hours of morning sunlight to maintain variegation and gold colors thru the season.