What to plant in this container?

g.king

Hi

I recently acquired this container from a friend and am looking for suggestions of what to plant in it.

I'm thinking of maybe having an upright feature plant and some trailing plants down the sides. I imagine that a rose is one of the obvious choices for the feature plant, but being quite new to gardening, I'm not sure what type. Open to alternative suggestions.
Also, what colour combinations would work well together (the container is grey).

The container is 21" high and 13" square at the top.



Thanks,
Gary

Ceres

With such a narrow base to the container, I think a rose might prove top heavy and the whole thing could blow over in the first high wind. Maybe it would be better to stick to something like nasturtiums which come in trailing varieties and upright. 

Pianoplayer

It depends where you are going to put it - if it can go in a shady spot, a fern cascading down would look nice.

SophieK

Definitely not a rose bush alas, you need at least 18in diameter for them.
But there are plenty of exciting thriller/filler/trailer combinations you can try, but as @Pianoplayer said, it all depends where it will be located and how much sun it'll get.

I love Sarah Raven's container collections, why don't you have a look there for inspiration? Some are even perennial combinations and can stay all year round (as long as you top up with fresh compost every year)

didyw

If that was my pot I'd have a grass in it. Probably a hakonechloa or a calamagrostis. Or a pennisetum to cascade up and down.