These four plants grow wild in the woods around Seattle. But they're showy enough to merit a place in the Northwest garden.
Twinberry: Twinberry is a honeysuckle relative. Cute yellow babydoll-dress flowers ripen into a conjoined pair of dark black berries in a peacock colored serving tray.
Lupine: You probably have a native lupine (pronounced "lupen") too. Ours has adjusted to our summer drought. But as a legume, these beautiful flowers are nitrogen fixers too. Note the bee!
Vine Maple: Whenever I see a hybrid azalea, covered in pink like a big ball of cotton candy, I feel a little sad. To ask so much of this plant, that it may be admired, then forgotten the rest of the year. In contrast, a vine maple's flowers are tiny treasures in an oasis of green. When planted in shade, they become beautifully leggy, their leaves like chartreuse clouds supported on storks' legs.
Foxglove: OK, so they aren't native (they're European), but foxgloves been polite guests on our shores long enough to have earned citizenship. Once invited, they'll spring up in new locations every year, remodeling the structure of your garden every year. But it's easy to pull them up if they come up where you don't want them. They transplant well too.
