A very good garden plant with many flowers held on strong stems, Astilbe 'Diamond' or 'Diamant' (Astilbe x arendsii) features graceful, long, slender, pure white flower plumes rising elegantly above fern-like mounds of deep green foliage. Glowing in the shade, each plume consists of hundreds of densely packed tiny flowers, each opening in succession, providing a long season of bloom from early to mid-summer.

One of the first Astilbes to flower, Astilbe 'Europa' (Astilbe japonica) features luminous, dense, pyramidal shaped, soft pink flower plumes which stand out in the night garden. Quite showy, they rise gracefully in late spring - early summer above an attractive mound of fern-like deep green, glossy foliage. Long-lasting, they turn a rich caramel color which provides winter interest to the garden.

Gracing the summer garden, award-winner Hemerocallis 'Catherine Woodbury' produces elegant, lavender-pink blossoms with a delicate golden eye atop a mound of arching leaves. Each very fragrant flower, 6 in. wide (15 cm), lasts no more than 24 hours (thus the common name 'Daylily'), opening up in the morning and withering during the forthcoming night, possibly replaced by another one on the same scape (flower stalk) the next day. Blooming in mid to late summer, this clump-forming perennial grows up to 30 in. tall (75 cm) and spreads slowly via rhizomes to 24 in. (60 cm).

Among the most popular variegated hostas ever introduced, Hosta 'Patriot' (Plantain Lily) is a clump-forming perennial forming a divinely eye-catching mound of large, ovate-shaped, satiny, dark green leaves adorned with irregular ivory margins. Racemes of funnel-shaped, lavender-blue flowers appear in summer on scapes rising well above the foliage mound to 34 in. tall (85 cm). A moderate to fast grower, 'Patriot' adds great color to the shady borders and containers.

Geranium 'Rozanne' is an exceptional, unique, and unsurpassed geranium selection. There are not enough superlatives to describe this fabulous perennial. Robust and vigorous, with one of the longest flowering periods of all hardy geraniums and rare blue-colored flowers of great decorative beauty, it is an ideal element of the garden, patio, or balcony. A prolific bloomer, it continuously produces masses of large violet-blue flowers with attractive purple-violet veins and small white centers for months of color from late spring to the first frost.