How to plant 15 beautiful hanging baskets with complete designer plant lists for each! Lots of tips on growing best hanging plants & flowers in sun & shade!
Oh, those hanging baskets overflowing with flowers and foliage of all colors and textures, they fill us with such wonder and awe. Everyone can re-create these, by choosing the right hanging basket plants for sun or shade locations, and mixing them in an artistic way!
As a garden designer, I often meet great gardeners and growers, who share with me their best secrets to growing beautiful hanging baskets, which I can’t wait to share with YOU today! 🙂
* Some resources in article are affiliate links. Full disclosure here .
Design tip 1: choose the right hanging basket plants for the right locations.
Before you plant a hanging basket, observe carefully if the location is sunny or shady. Keep in mind that the position of the sun changes seasonally. For example, the north side of a building can be in shade during winter and in hot sun during summer. Also “sunny” in Seattle is very different from “sunny” in Phoenix!
Plant list 1 ( first image above) : Purple and red Petunias, Yellow Coreopsis ( or other trailing yellow daisies ), Variegated Plectranthus.
Plant list 2 ( second image above) : Yellow and orange Nasturtium, Coreopsis ( or other trailing yellow daisies ), Calibrachoa ‘Million Bells Trailing Magenta’. ( Source: 1 | 2 )
( Some of the helpful resources are affiliate links. Full disclosure here. )
Design tip 2: use easy care plants and flowers for hanging baskets.
Plant list 3 : Deep maroon Petunia, pink Variegated Geranium, Sweet Potato Vine. ( Source: 3 )
As you can see, some of the best hanging basket plants and flowers are trailing flowers and vines like Petunias and Million Bells ( Calibrachoa, the Petunia Look-Alike ). They are easy to care for , and bloom profusely. They also come in such a great varieties of colors! Just make sure you select the trailing varieties, not the mounding varieties!
Plant list 4 : Petunias and Calibrachoa in red and white, red Geranium, Blue Lobelia erinus, Variegated Plectranthus. ( Source: 4 )
Design tip 3: how to line hanging baskets, best soil for hanging baskets, how often to water them.
A good size hanging flower basket is usually 14″ to 16″ wide, and they can come with Coco coir liners , which are great materials to line a hanging basket. Choose good quality potting soil that contains peat moss and perlite. Add slow-release, complete fertilizer such as this to the mix.
Plant list 5 : Petunias in blue and white, Lobelia erinus . ( Source: 5 )
Lobelia is a sun-loving non-stop bloomer with masses of tiny blue, pink, white, purple, or bi-colored flowers from spring till fall. Choose trailing Lobelia varieties such as Lobelia erinus for hanging baskets.
Plant list 6 : Light pink Petunia, Purple Verbena, Nemesia ‘Safari White’. ( Source: 6 )
Hanging flower baskets require more regular watering than most container plantings. Don’t let the soil mix dry out. Ideally, baskets in the sun need to be watered every day, baskets in the shade need to be watered once every 2 days.
Plant list 7 : Pink Geranium, Petunias in light purple, Lobelia erinus . ( Source: jpgardening.wordpress.com, site no longer available.)
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24 colorful container garden plantings with plant list for each!
Design tip 4: best hanging basket plants and flowers to use for shade.
Back to our hanging flower baskets: what if you want to plant a colorful hanging basket in the shade?
There are actually some very beautiful and showy shade-loving plants to choose from. Check out the following four examples!
Plant list 8 ( great for shade ) : Begonia × tuberhybrida Tuberous Begonias in orange and yellow, Yellow Coreopsis ( or other trailing yellow daisies ), Lysimachia ‘Goldilocks’ / Creeping Jenny. ( Source: 8)
Plant list 9 ( great for shade ): Caladium ‘Celebration’ and Caladium ‘Rose Glow’, Asarina scandens ‘Snow White’ , Lysimachia ‘Goldilocks’ / Creeping Jenny ( Source: 9 )
Plant list 10 ( great for shade ) : Begonia × tuberhybrida / Tuberous Begonias in orange and yellow, Tradescantia zebrina / Wandering jew plant, Sweet Potato Vine, Lobelia erinus, Variegated Plectranthus . ( Source: 10 )
Plant list 11 ( great for shade ) : Dragon Wing Begonia, Asparagus Fern ( Source: 11 )
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16 colorful planters for shade, with plant list for each!
Design tip 5: how to create colorful mixes of hanging plants.
Plants like violas and petunias come in many colors. Just by mixing these different varieties of the same plants, you can create a very colorful hanging planter!
Plant list 12 : Mixed color Violas, great for cool climate like early spring. ( Source: 12 )
Plant list 13 : Purple and pink Petunias, Coreopsis ( or other trailing yellow daisies ), Lobelia erinus, Red Verbena. ( Source: 13 )
A hanging basket can also become an attractive wall basket ! These wall brackets for hanging plants can offer a great way to dress up an empty wall!
Plant list 14 ( great for shade ) : Begonia × tuberhybrida / Tuberous Begonias in orange and yellow, Fuschia, Lysimachia ‘Goldilocks’ / Creeping Jenny.
Plant list 15 : Red and pink Petunias, Coreopsis ( or other trailing yellow daisies ), blue Lobelia erinus. ( Source )
If you love indoor gardening, come tour our indoor garden with 18 favorite easy indoor plants!
Happy planting!
I am looking for perennials for a hanging basket. Can you recommend any? I am in zone 8b. Washington state.
I love the viola basket, #12. How many would you recommend for a single basket? In addition, I recently had 2 petunia hanging baskets that were not very full/bountiful on top. They looked like they were losing their “hair on the top of their head” so to speak…. aka thinning on top😉 how would I prevent this with the violas or any other container planting(s) in the future? TIA.
hi Bonnie! i would put 6 violas per medium size basket. the trick to really full basket is to use really good potting soil with fertilizers, and water very frequently, especially n hot and dry areas!
I love basket 9! Could I ask how many of each plant if possible?
Hi Chris! We would use 1 each of the Caladium, and 2 each of the trailing plants. 🙂
Did you notice the link you posted for the slow-release fertilizer takes you to Amazon to Osmocote Plus. Some of the reviews say the product contains little plastic balls that are left in the soil after all the fertilizer has been released. If true, not a good thing. The ad does not mention what the “empty shell” is made of.
hi Teri! thank you SO much for pointing this out! i have updated the fertilizer to an organic fertilizer – https://amzn.to/39QG2Td ! 🙂 there are more and better options i should update to, thank you!
How many plants did you need for basket #3? It’s beautiful
about 3 of each kind! 🙂
So beautiful!!! Plant list #3 is my favorite! About how many of each plant should you put in the basket?
hi! i would say 2-3 of each. happy planting! 🙂
Beautiful. BUT where did you get that red pulley-type thing to hang the baskets with?
hi! you can find them on ebay and amazon, and paint them with the color you like 🙂
Lovely….these are just perfect tips for creating my own custom flower baskets for spring.
I cannot keep petunias or the bells alive. I really don’t think I water every other day!!! These examples are gorgeous!!!! I love sweet potato vines!!!
hi dawn, i think these baskets dry out so fast, watering is key! =)
I have always wanted to put some hanging baskets up in front of the house. They are so beautiful and decorative.
Seeing those beautiful flowers bring joy to my heart and remind me that spring is near. Thanks for sharing.
Wow! These flowers are so beautiful. I love all of it. I wish i could do gardening like this too. I am going to try it this year!
These are awesome!! I’m so excited for spring so I can start my garden, and now I want flowers too!
I love this! I am very much looking forward to Spring and this post makes me even more excited! Thanks for the tips!
Obsessed with your tips here! The flowers look so vibrant and looking forward to all the decorations we’ll be making when spring pops in!
These are stunning! I honestly would love to have flowers like these outside the house. but I’m awful with keeping plants alive!! Flowers always seem to brighten up places and make you feel a bit better about life I find.
I love hanging baskets of flowers! We have a few in our garden and two hanging outside our front door, they’re so gorgeous – and out of the way from the dogs to play in them.
These are some gorgeous arrangements. I get a hanging plant once in awhile but my mom always had them hanging when I was growing up.
Wonderful! We have a few hooks on the front porch for hanging baskets, but the last ones we had didn’t last through the winter. I can’t wait until it’s warm enough to put more out there. These ones are so colorful!
I love hanging baskets of flowers, they really brighten up the house. These tips are really helpful as I’m not the best gardener!
I love love these! I think the Sweet Potato Vine and Yellow Coreopsis are my favorites because I haven’t seen them before. I am looking for a new plant to hanging down a shelve and I might have to give some of these a try!
I didn’t really know that there were trailing and mound versions of the same plant! These tips are perfect for creating my own custom flower baskets for spring.