As a professional Garden Designer, the majority of the plants I use provide more than a simple short term display of flowering colour, particularly where space is limited. I need plants to be hardy, low maintenance and have good longevity.  

My ‘Designer Plant’ of the Month for January 2024 is fantastic evergreen shrub called: Sarcococca confusa (common names: Sweet Box, Christmas Box).

There are various types of Sarcococca commonly available, from the ‘confusa’ which is a larger shrub, up to roughly 2m (over 6ft) in height, to the more compact ‘humilis’ which reaches roughly 60cm (2ft). The fairly dense, glossy, dark green oval leaves are present throughout the year meaning that the shrub is great for providing some structure and substance to a border, particularly when the perennial plants have died down in the winter.

Like its cousin Buxus Sempervirens (or Box), one of its key virtues is that it will grow well in full shade and is happy in most soils. It is a very hardy shrub which can deal with a fair amount of abuse: wind, drought and even pollution. Also, as it is fairly slow growing it can be largely left to its own devices, with minimal pruning for shaping purposes.

However, it is this time of year Sarcococca really shines. Throughout the winter the small, cream, tufted flowers release an intoxicatingly strong sweet vanilla fragrance. If placed by a kitchen door or next to a pathway, visitors will get a waft of scent every time they pass by.  The flowers are followed by an abundance of attractive dark purple spherical berries, which provide an additional decorative dimension in early spring.

Sarcococca is a good, strong evergreen shrub which can deal with a difficult shady corner and provides real winter interest in the form of an enticing sweet fragrance. In my mind, Sarcococca should have a place in any garden.

Whorling up each stem from the base of the plant are thick elongated evergreen leaves. These leaves usually have a slightly glaucus texture which contrasts wonderfully with the bright lime green of the ‘flower heads’ or bracts. The actual flowers have small reddish centres, adding another interesting contrast to the pallete. The shape and colour of this Euphorbia would contrast nicely with any earlier flowering blues or purples, such as Pulmonaria or Hellebores.     

Euphorbias, in general, are pretty tough plants that will usually grow in a wide variety of places.  The ‘Wulfenii’ is from the Mediterranean and therefore prefers sunnier conditions. Once established it can be grown in fairly dusty dry soil, even thriving in rock or gravel gardens.  As long as it isn’t too wet or in too much shade it will be quite happy and only require a little pruning to shape and to improve flowering.

One word of warning is that the sap from the stems is poisonous and can be an irritant. Please take extra care when planting and pruning. However, this goes for many popular plants grown in gardens up and down the country.

The Cornus sanguinea ‘Midwinter Fire’ is a deciduous shrub that is in full leaf over the spring and summer months. The large bright green ovals leaves of summer turn yellow in autumn before falling. The ‘Midwinter Fire’ has fairly small and insignificant creamy white flowers followed by small black berries. However, like many similar small flowering Dogwood shrubs, the ‘Midwinter Fire’ is really grown for its brightly coloured stem. For the coldest three of four months of the year, the branches of the ‘Midwinter Fire’ take on, as the name would suggest, a flame like appearance. Each stem has a dual tone effect with a bright yellow at the base that gradually translates into a rich orangey red at the tip. When planted against dark evergreens or framed by the naked cold earth of the season, the Midwinter Fire provides an extremely eye-catching focal point.

Cornus sanguinea ‘Midwinter Fire’ is a fairly small shrubs, growing to around 3ft (90cm) across and 5ft (1.5m) high. However, for optimum winter colour it is best to prune the stems back hard each year, to around 3 inches from the base, as the bright colour is only prevalent in the new growth.  The ‘Midwinter Fire’ prefers a sunny spot, but doesn’t like to get too dry. It often looks good planted in groups or with other Cornus shrubs, and looks great planted by water where it will happily drink from the moist soil and reflect beautifully in the still surface.

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With his usual ‘no messing around’ approach, Daniel Herrington of Daniel Herrington Landscapes arrived at 8am on the dot and literally jumped out of his van, marker spray in hand ready to mark out the design. Dan and his colleague/sidekick Wayne, had quickly worked out the area and within an hour Dan was in a digger ripping up hard Malvern ground.

Lisa and I managed to source all the build materials, which, along with the beautiful sandstone paving kindly given to us by Global Stone, arrived in the afternoon. Dan and Wayne had all the foundations laid by the end of the day, ready for the paving to go down tomorrow morning.

As we have all travelled quite far: I from Northampton, Lisa from Bristol and Dan and Wayne from Midsummer Norton, accommodation has been laid on for the team. We have a great caravan from E&L Caravan Hire of Worcestershire, with 4 separate births and all the mod-cons you would need. After an evening at a nice local pub, Lisa on the cola, me on the ale and the Somerset Boys on the cider (of course!), it was back to the caravan for an early night. Dan wanted to make sure he would be the first contractor on site tomorrow morning; we’ll see.