Creating a Gargoyle Garden
A Goth or gargoyle garden will contain more necrotic plants within their ominous framework, even going so far as to chillingly keep all the dead ones. Death in a goth garden is an appropriate theme. What I have been able to re-use a few times (much to my embarrassment) from freezes or drought situations for Halloween accents are plants that have given up the ghost. These dead shrubs have strong grayish-brown branches, but no leaves were kept near my shed from the previous winter freeze and brought back to life, so to speak, for Halloween. Sticking a few completely lifeless, scraggly bushes in strategic locations with cobwebs floating in the wind are a fun way to recycle and create an eerie atmosphere for the October 31st celebration. Gothic gardens can be easily recognized with their atramentous faux palette. I say "faux" because the color black does not exist in the plant kingdom, although diligent botanists are working on it.
Young or old goths prefer the nighttime darkness, shady fogs, and the dearth of winter flora, while shunning the pastel, frilly, romantic colors of spring blooms, warmth, and sunlight. You will find deep, blood-red burgandies as found in the hollyhocks and daylily families.
The almost-pitch black leaves found with many varieties of perennial coleus, like 'Magilla Perilla', 'Black Dragon', 'Black Ruffle', or the darkest black coleus, 'Dark Star' are arcanely unique in sunny tropical gardens. Vampirish purples of the buddleias, 'Black Knight and black petals of the 'Witch of Endor' irises will contrast nicely with the yellow foliage of the dwarf durante dewdrops. Punishingly beautiful flowers with intentional gory names, such as bleeding hearts, bloodroot, blood lily, and love-lies-bleeding will be blooming their little hearts out in any goth garden worth its' salt. You can also find captivating botanical behavior, such as carnivorous plants, bat plants, cast-iron plants and dragon lilies that smell horrible, for those with iron stomachs.
Gothic Gardens Have Whimsy and Magic
Goth gardens tend to be on the whimsical side as well, so you will see a myriad of mythical creatures hiding in the bushes, possibly fey folke by large mushrooms, woodland sprites in the branches of trees, and butterfly carriages floating in the wind. Feel free to invoke your own dark side in decorating your garden by inviting the sidhe* to visit.
The hardscape decorations could be anything from scary pumpkin faces, bat houses, and pet graves, to demented cement guardians protecting the ground floors of your garden rather than traditional cathedral cornices.
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