with narcissus and tulips. Photograph: Allan Jenkins
The Magnolia stellata is almost naked now. A few browning brittle leaves and rabbit-tail buds. Much of the summer’s pot planting has been tidied away. The roof terrace has lost its blush.
The tall, swooning salvia has been the new plant of the year – almost elegantly wasted now after months of cascading blue flowers. Beloved by bees.
It has survived Henri’s annual autumn purge. We will prune it and hope for much of the same again. As ever, I wish I’d noted its name.
The David Austin roses are slowing down. The Poet’s Wife, though, is still throwing out butter-coloured, citrus-scented bloom. The Bengal Crimson is a mass of green leaf, crowned by occasional flashes of colour. The orange geum is in quiet retreat. The dark hellebore is starting to come into its own.
The scented-pink and the old-school deep red geranium are a mass of turning leaf, but it’s all about spring pots at our house with the arrival of bulbs from Farmer Gracy in Holland. We’ve settled on Gracy as our favoured supplier (for now) as they send daffodils and narcissus to Denmark where Henri has just been planting them in a meadow with the girls. We will be steering clear of tulips there until we’re better recovered from the decimation by deer.
The London roof terrace, though, will be home to tulips Flashback, Princess Irene, Red Impression and Violet Beauty, planted in layered pots ‘lasagne style’ with narcissus Pheasant’s Eye and tazetta Paperwhite.
The paperwhite tips are just now starting to green and I will be watching them over the next months for when they will be joined by their deeper-planted cousins. There are just five pots, a mix of taller and some shorter tulips, plus the narcissus. The tulips also chosen by whether they flower early or late.
I have grown to love this quiet time on the terrace: the gentle dull lull before an explosion of colour.
Allan Jenkins’s Plot 29 (4th Estate, £9.99) is out now. Order it for £8.49 from guardianbookshop.com
Follow Allan on Instagram @allanjenkins21
