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By December, the garden will be past its summer best but if you have planned carefully, you can create areas of colour that will cheer you up throughout winter. What you need is a few shrubs and under plant with some winter Hellebores and bulbs. Evergreen dome shaped shrubs that do not get too large include Skimmia. There are a number of varieties so if you want flowers then choose Skimmia japonica Rubella with red flower buds, or...

November tends to be a time for tidying up the garden ready for winter. I am pruning a lot so I find my shoulders get a good work out when helping clients in this month. Oranges and reds are the predominate colours from leaves on Acers, Cherries and Apple trees then there are berries. Cotoneaster shrubs come in many different varieties and species from large trees such as Cotoneaster Cornubia which forms an evergreen umbrella shape...

October is the ideal time to divide and split perennials and put in new plants. The soil will be warm from summer, damp from the rain enabling plants to root well and settle in over winter. It’s also a good time, early in the month, to turf lawns or seed new lawns. There are shrubs in flower in October including the Yucca. They have to be treated with caution as they have needle sharp tips to the sword like leaves – I cut each tip off...

As summer turns into autumn, colour from flowers can continue well into September. Shrubs in flower include Fuschias, that are such good value with a long flowering period. Fuschia magellanica is one of the hardiest types with pink or white flowers. They will grow in sun or slight shade and provide an arching shrub about 1m in diameter. Abelia Grandiflora is an underrated shrub with lots of small white flowers with a lovely scent. It...

August is a riot of bright reds, oranges, yellow and cooler blues, with herbaceous plants taking centre stage whilst the flowering shrubs retire into the background. This year has been good for slugs and snails so some plants have suffered and can be reduced to sorry stems. Taller plants for the back of a border include Knipofia (Red Hot Poker) and the variety Bees Sunset has 90cm flower heads in orange, fading to yellow, in late...

In July, the perennials take centre stage with so many different flowers to choose from. If you have a sunny border,plant it up for mid summer colour. For those with light well drained soil, plants such as Lychnis coronaria is an easy to grow flower with rosettes of silver grey leaves and in summer has 50cm stems of magenta pink or white flowers. They self seed easily. For something different, Limonium latifolium or Sea Lavender will...