Window boxes enchant with the seasonal delights of the garden. They bring vertical interest to unite home and landscape and emphasize or soften features. Reminiscent of European villages, these displays exude charm and natural connection. They also serve a variety of purposes, even in ancient Rome, where city dwellers without gardens used them to grow culinary and medicinal plants.
Use window boxes in their intended spaces – beneath windows – or along a fence line, on a blank wall, balcony, porch railing, etc. Design them as you would any container, with focal point specimens, filler plants, and trailing varieties. Use colors from your garden, home, or those that inspire you.
The beauty of window boxes is their ability to enliven and change. Evergreens and perennials flourish year-round, while annuals bring a diversity of color and form. They are a feast for the eyes from the inside looking out to the garden, and fragrance, too, is a bonus on those open-window days.
When planting a window box, provide drainage holes and a well-draining potting mix. Follow sun and shade recommendations and combine plants with similar cultural requirements. Water consistently, especially during dry periods, as these small planters dry out more quickly than in-ground plantings.
Impatiens
Midnight Blend Impatiens Seeds
Pansies
Swiss Giants Blend Pansy Seeds
Lobelia
Color Trailing Lobelia Seeds
Geraniums
Boost cheer with vibrant, versatile geraniums.
Geraniums are among the most popular blooms for window boxes and planters because of their vibrant blooms and rich foliage. Their rounded, ruffly leaves are true green, mottled, or variegated. Color-saturated flower clusters rise above leafy branches throughout the warm season.
Common garden geraniums, scented geraniums, and ivy-leaf geraniums feature distinct leaves, flowers, and forms. From cherry red blooms to lemony scented leaves to trailing stems, geranium varieties serve many garden situations.
Geraniums bring texture and vibrancy to the flower box display. They make a striking statement on their own and pair beautifully with an endless combination of plantings. Use them as bold filler and embellish with trailing plants like variegated ivy, dichondra, creeping jenny, calibrachoa, and vinca.
Provide geraniums with at least four to six hours of sunlight. In hot climates, offer protection from direct afternoon sun. Geraniums thrive with regular water in well-drained soils, allowing the soil to dry out slightly between waterings. Pinch off spent blooms to encourage more flowers and a full, leafy plant.
Impatiens
Grace your window box with the vibrant hues of impatiens.
Like geraniums, impatiens are among the most popular annuals. They flower profusely in a myriad of colors, from baby pink to neon magenta. Impatiens perform well in partial to full shade, with different species and hybrids tolerating more sunlight.
New Guinea impatiens, Impatiens hawkeri, feature large flowers with elongated leaves, often deep in color with a metallic sheen. They tolerate the sun better than the tuberous I. walleriana, the sweet, shade-loving garden classic, and are more resistant to mildew diseases.
For a sun-loving impatiens hybrid, look to the SunpatiensⓇ series. Sunpatiens handle full sun, bringing the pop of the impatiens’ colorful bloom to the sunny window. All impatiens require organically rich soils and consistent moisture throughout the summer.
In our window box example, blended pastels and complementary shades incorporate blush pink impatiens to flank a central bright pink impatiens focal point. Chartreuse heuchera brings high contrast, and trailing ‘Silver Falls’ dichondra and lavender calibrachoa cool the display. Rose angelonia gives spiky, upright interest in the backdrop.
Sweet Alyssum
Enhance your planter with delicate white blossoms cascading elegantly.
Sweet alyssum is a petite annual covered in globes of fragrant white blooms. The bursts of snow white make it an ideal filler planting, especially pretty cascading over the edges of a window box. Alyssum’s feathery foliage and small flowers bring fine texture to the display.
Sweet alyssum brightens up dark compositions and contrasts highly with reds (like geraniums) and violets (here, a purple-blue angelonia). The dark green, glossy leaves of boxwood anchor the arrangement. Throw in lime green coleus and the composition is complete!
Sweet alyssum is also perfect for pastel color schemes and white-themed plantings against variegated or silvery foliage, like dusty miller.
Sweet alyssum is an easy-care annual in full to part sun with well-drained soils. Plants may turn yellow and fade in hot summer climates, only to resume blooming with cooler temperatures.
Bacopa
Balance bold focal plants with delicate, colorful bacopa blooms.
Bacopa is a showy little trailing plant with flat-petaled white, blue, purple, or pink flowers. Use it as a cascading accent in window boxes for its tidy appearance and cheery flowers from spring through frost.
White bacopa cools down a bright color scheme of complementary colors. Red and orange calibrachoa, coleus, and lantana contrast beautifully with violet heliotrope. The trailing white bacopa flowers anchor the scheme and give the eye a place to rest.
Bacopa is a carefree annual, but it can fade in extreme heat. In hot summer climates, look for heat-resistant varieties like ‘Tried and True’ or ‘MegaCopa,’ with more prominent blooms. Bacopa needs organically rich, evenly moist soils to thrive, though it tolerates drying out between waterings.
Scaevola
Enhance your window box with colorful, low-maintenance scaevola blooms.
Scaevola, or fan flower, is a lovely spreading annual with fan-shaped blooms in blue, lavender, pink, and white. The showy flowers and trailing features make scaevola a favorite for window boxes and hanging baskets.
Fan flower pairs beautifully with red geraniums, lysimachia, and lime green foliage. It suits pastel blends and provides a strong contrast to opposite colors. Dark purple foliage plants like purple heart and sweet potato vine are striking companions.
Carefree scaevola tolerates heat and drought and is pest-resistant. It grows best in sun to partial shade in hot, dry conditions. Allow the soil to dry out slightly between waterings. Plants are “self-cleaning” and don’t need deadheading for continual blooming.
Pansies and Violas
Embrace the vibrant hues of trailing pansies and violas.
Violas and pansies (both in the Viola genus) boast a profusion of cool-season blooms in almost endless shades and color combinations. Pansies bear bigger flowers on larger plants, while violas yield smaller blooms on compact forms. Opt for trailing pansies for delicate blooms to spill over a planter’s edge.
This arrangement’s dominant blues stand out against the leafy backdrop and coral accents of heuchera, primrose, and snapdragons. Light blue and trailing ‘Freefall Marina’ pansies create a lovely splash of color.
Pansies and violas grow easily in well-draining soils. These annuals, especially pansies, benefit from removing spent blooms to promote flowering.
Snapdragons
Consider vibrant snapdragons as the centerpiece.
With their range of flower heights and colors, snapdragons are perfect for window boxes. Use them as the “thriller” features of the arrangements – tall, upright spikes of intense color – and surround them with low-growing mounding and trailing plants.
Use bold snapdragons with coral and purple nemesia, ornamental grasses, and dusty miller. Blue and purple ageratum or bacopa soften the mix. Trailing plants like ivy, creeping jenny, and sweet potato vine make a vibrant backdrop. Snaps are beautiful among pansies and violas with evergreens, too.
Snapdragons thrive in the sun in moist, well-drained soils. Remove spent blooms to promote flowering. In mild climates, snaps bloom all winter long. In colder climates, snapdragons bloom in spring, summer, and fall.
Verbena
Tone down warm colors with long-blooming verbena.
Verbena boasts a long bloom season in a variety of forms and colors and is ideal for a sunny window box. Annual verbena yields clusters of small, star-shaped flowers on the tips of mounding or trailing stems with dark green foliage. Perennial species of trailing verbena feature similar low-growing forms, while others grow upright with blooms on tall, wanding stems.
Trailing and annual verbenas span the color spectrum from pastel white, blue, and peach to rich red, magenta, and violet. Their colorful globes of color complement petunias, geraniums, lobelia, and many more. The red verbena pictured mirrors the vertical red geranium for an eye-catching show.
Verbena tolerates bright sun and drying out between waterings, but it appreciates regular water in containers for best blooming. Perennial verbena, like ‘Homestead Purple,’ is a good performer in hot, humid climates. Trim verbena if it gets leggy to rejuvenate growth.
Calibrachoa
Add cascading calibrachoa for a vibrant, year-long window display.
Calibrachoa makes a vibrant window box feature with a cascading habit and loads of petite bell flowers from spring through late fall. Also called million bells, calibrachoa resembles a mini-petunia in flower and form. Bloom colors range from lavender to yellow to scarlet to purple-black. As with petunias, there is a calibrachoa color for every garden palette.
Calibrachoa complements colorful flowering plants and foliage in lime, orange, purple, and magenta. Million bells pair with any number of plants for stunning designs. Look for SuperbellsⓇ calibrachoa for abundant bloom coverage from early spring to light frost.
Calibrachoa handles hot summers better than petunias and withstands some drought. They require fast-draining soils rich in organic matter. Calibrachoa grows in sun or part shade, though at least four to six hours of sun promotes best flowering.
Petunia
Transform your garden with vibrant, low-maintenance petunias all season.
Petunias are a garden classic because of their showy waves of blooms from spring through frost, in hues from bubblegum pink to velvety black. With single, double, or ruffled flowers and a mounding, trailing form, petunias fit almost any planter combination.
Use petunias as a single planting for full seasonal color or combine complementary shades. Pair petunias with geraniums for a floriferous display. Mix them with calibrachoa, verbena, and creeping jenny for contrasting trailing textures.
Petunias thrive in full sun. For Southern gardens, try an improved variety that tolerates heat and humidity, like SupertuniaⓇ. Wave varieties are cascading petunias with sound performance in various climates.
In the right site, petunias are low-maintenance annuals with little watering and soil requirements, except that the soil is well-draining. If plants get leggy, give them a trim to rejuvenate growth.
Hibiscus
Create a tropical oasis with vibrant, day-blooming hibiscus flowers.
Hibiscus lends a tropical look to the window box display, with huge disc flowers in a range of colors, from soft to neon. Although the flowers open only for a day, these floriferous plants produce numerous blooms simultaneously for successional blooms.
Here, a yellow tropical hibiscus blooms amongst lobelia, creeping jenny, deep red coleus, and the tropical vine pink mandevilla. This cheery combination of blooms relies on attractive, glossy green foliage for a balanced backdrop.
Grow tropical hibiscus in a sunny garden location with consistent, even moisture for containers. Hibiscus are tough annuals, but these water-lovers don’t withstand extended dry spells.
Annual Vinca
Add drama with trailing annual vinca blooms.
Annual vinca brings abundant color with low maintenance needs. Blooms range from pastel to bold hues against an attractive backdrop of deep green, glossy foliage. Flower “eyes” brighten bloom centers in contrasting colors, often clear white, yellow, or pink.
Annual vinca makes a good filler specimen if your window box receives lots of sunlight in high heat conditions. Trailing varieties create lovely accents and spill over the sides. Pair vinca with any sun-loving annuals and perennials for a summer show.
Annual vinca differs from perennial vinca, Vinca minor, which is also a pretty trailing plant in window boxes where it stays contained. Variegated foliage and deep periwinkle blooms are a sweet accent in partial shade containers.
Annual vinca thrives in hot and dry conditions in well-draining soils, though container plants need more regular water since they dry out more quickly. At planting time, fertilize vinca with a balanced, organic application. A single application lasts all season, as vinca doesn’t require many added nutrients.
Begonia
Adorn your window box with graceful, shade-loving begonias.
Begonias are graceful window box plants with arching stems and thick, glossy leaves in various shapes and colors. Pendulous, everpresent blooms cluster atop tuberous branches. Depending on the variety, begonias perform in tough spots like dry shade with heat and humidity.
In shady spots, graceful pink, white, or red blooms give a lovely effect with colorful foliage plants like caladiums. They’ll tolerate morning sun, but dappled light to shade is best.
Begonias perform well in the shade garden in well-drained soils. Their flowers are edible and have a citrusy flavor.
Lobelia
Accentuate your window box with vibrant, cascading lobelia blooms.
Lobelia features striking blue flowers that bring high contrast to the window box. Tubular blooms cover gray-green leaves from late spring through frost. Additional bloom colors include powder blue, lavender, white, and pink on plants that trail or mound, depending on the variety. Masses of dainty flowers cover plants when in full bloom.
Lobelia creates a cloud of blue and white blooms in our window box example. This spray brings fine texture to the pairing with magenta annual vinca and succulent foliage. Stonecrop, kelanchoe (or any larger, broad-leaved plant) beautifully weighs the combination.
Cut plants back after each bloom period to encourage successive flushes. Lobelia thrives in full or dappled sunlight with moist, organically rich, well-drained soil. Look for heat-tolerant varieties like ‘Techno Heat Dark Blue’ for longer blooming during the summer heat.
Nasturtium
Add a pop of color with versatile nasturtiums in window boxes.
Nasturtium is popular for its round, lily-pad leaves in true green on stems that climb or trail. It bears tubular yellow, orange, red, or cream blooms, sometimes all on the same plant. With a loose and rambling form, nasturtium lends itself to informal and naturalistic window box designs.
Newer nasturtium varieties like ‘Black Velvet’ feature deep maroon blooms, and the ‘Alaska’ series has variegated leaves. Use nasturtium as a single display or Incorporate trailing varieties into compositions with marigolds, salvia, and ornamental grasses. They’re fun in an edible or veggie-themed window box. The leaf and flower of nasturtium are edible and have a peppery flavor.
Nasturtiums are easy-to-grow annuals in sunny locations. They tolerate dry conditions and partial shade but bloom best in sunny windowboxes with regular water.
Final Thoughts
Window boxes bring cheer and vibrancy (or grace and serenity, depending on your style) to the vertical garden. They unite the home with the surrounding landscape and give versatility in scale. Like container gardens, window boxes maximize space for adding natural elements.
I could play with window box designs all day. With endless combinations of texture and color, the main thing is to have fun choosing your style and color scheme. There are no rules, just winning combinations. Let the season inspire you to incorporate a bit of old-world charm.