For years and year, I documented “window box inspiration” with my camera for a future date when I’d have a home of my own where I could install and plant window boxes overflowing with blooms. I’ve always loved how charming homes with window boxes are but often found a lot of the examples I saw to be very sparsely filled and a bit boring.
The most beautiful ones I photographed tended to be outside the brownstones on Beacon Hill in Boston, or done professionally by businesses. Legal Seafood is one of the standout examples I recall being wowed by a few summers ago in fact. 
What I didn’t realize in my garden fantasizing days was just how expensive it is to properly fill out window boxes. They look best when the plants are densely packed which obviously means = more plants. It would be fabulous to stud my spring window boxes with overflowing daffodils, boxwood, ivy, and pansies but it adds up quickly.
I’ve also realized that what you use to fill your window boxes can cause them to become a bit high maintenance. Unless they’re very easily accessible, dead-heading flowers to proliferate growth and keeping them watered can be a challenge.
Last summer I tried to manage the latter issue (of watering) with my purchase of four of these Mayne “Fairfield” window boxes which feature a self-watering reservoir. So far, I’ve been really pleased with them, though I am embarrassed to admit that I only managed to get one mounted and hung in time for the tail end of the summer.
Since family will be coming over for an Easter egg hunt this weekend, I’m hoping to get them installed and planted by the end of the day today and will fill them with whatever I have on hand. I might pull up some of the ground cover ivy we have growing in abundance in the backyard, fill in with some creeping jenny that is also growing in random spots in the garden and sprinkle in the remaining bare spots with the pansies I got earlier in the week.
I’d love to throw in some daffodils but unfortunately, I didn’t think to plant the bulbs in the fall so I’ll have to table that idea for next spring. So I may beg some forsythia branches off the neighbors and tuck them into the pots for some additional color, or else, go the faux route and supplement with some flowering branches or pussy willows for texture and height.
I’ll definitely be more prepared next year, but it helps to start somewhere. What are your favorite window box plantings and combinations?
Married with Style 