I’m fascinated by the beauty of plants. They are the tools to express myself while designing landscape and gardens.
My real involvement and experience with plants started when we moved in 1982 to Hummelo, a tiny village in the eastern part of the Netherlands. We started a nursery to grow perennials. The idea to move was created by an irresistible desire to experiment with plants. The knowledge and experience would enable us to make better designs that really work.
In the early eighties I found a seedling on the nursery. It added a new aspect. This seedling was so special, that we decided to propagated it. It became a successful plant with the name Salvia ‘Purple Rain’. Nowadays all over the world well known as a superb garden plant. That turned out to be the start of our interest in breeding new perennials. From that moment on I started to make plant selections, breed with plants I thought might have potential; either to create a new color or because they possessed better qualities. These qualities could vary from architectural value to simply stronger or pest resistant. This process resulted in a large number of good, reliable selections, all well known in the plant world for their specific character, beauty or use in gardens.
In those days we also founded ‘Future Plants’, a company that specializes in and focuses on selecting, growing, breeding and protecting plants that are useful and have all the necessary qualities for landscaping and public green.
Plants for landscaping and public green should be beautiful and attractive, not troublesome and must be reliable. When that plant also attracts insects, butterflies and birds, it is a truly ideal plant!
Please visit the ‘Future Plants’ website to look at the plants we tested and strongly recommend for landscaping and public green. They are for sale in many garden center’s all over Europe and the USA.