Forget-me-not White

The white form, and the one to reach for when a corner is too dark for colour. White reflects what little light there is, so a drift of these under a tree or along a north wall genuinely brightens the ground in a way blue cannot, particularly at dusk and first thing in the morning.

The other use is as a neutral. A carpet of white under dark tulips, ‘Queen of Night’ especially, is one of the most reliable pieces of spring planting there is, and it works because the white gives the near-black flowers an edge to be seen against.

Same low fuzzy mounds and starry flowers as the blue, April to June, and the same biennial cycle: sow May to July, rosette through the winter, flower the next spring, die. It self-seeds reliably, though white forget-me-nots crossed with blue ones nearby give blue seedlings within a generation or two, so keep them apart if you want to hold the colour. And as with all of them, the plants go mildewed and grey after flowering and are best pulled.