The shade tables at your favorite garden center offer a full gamut of perennials with foliage as their main feature. (Picture the intricate fronds of hardy ferns, the bold, broad leaves of giant hostas, the polka dots on pulmonaria.) We’ve learned well to combine foliage perennials for texture and color in shaded spaces, yet this strategy isn’t as often employed in the sun—likely because there we have many more options of plants with flowers as the main draw. Still, wouldn’t it be nice to mix in some leafy delights?
To get started, here are a few perennials and shrubby plants that like the sun and contribute interesting color, shape or texture through their leaves. If you look beneath the sun tables’ blooms on your next plant-shopping trip, you’ll likely find even more to spark your creativity.
BORDER SEDUM
Upright, mound-forming border sedums () have enjoyed popularity for decades thanks to their ease of care and their late bloom. Their dense heads of tiny pink or white flowers appear in late summer or autumn, feeding pollinators and obscuring
