The year of the lilies in my peony garden
This past summer, the lilies transformed my peony garden into a luminous showcase of colour and perfume. From the first elegant buds to the final dramatic blooms, they delivered one breathtaking moment after another. Each variety brought its own personality: vivid early Asiatics, towering late-blooming Orientals, dramatic regals, and my beloved Orienpets with their bold presence and exquisite fragrances.
Some stood like sentinels above the peonies, others filled the gaps in midsummer when the borders needed fresh energy, and quite a few surprised me by blooming even more spectacularly than last year. Walking through the garden felt like moving through a gallery of living sculptures, each lily demanding a pause, a closer look, and often a photo (or dozens of photos).
In this post, I’m sharing my favourite highlights from the season: the colours, textures, surprises, and cultivars that truly shone in my Zone 5 garden. If you love lilies (or are thinking about adding more to your borders next year), I hope these moments inspire you as much as they inspired me. Spring is not too late to plant, and some online catalogues are already available!
A peony garden filled with lilies
Over the past ten years, more than 100 lily cultivars have been introduced into the peony garden. Apart from 2 or 3, each was planted as a bulb, in groups ranging from a single bulb to clusters of ten in the same location, spaced 6 to 12 inches apart depending on bulb type and size. Bulbs can be planted either early in spring or in fall, right up until frost. I once mixed bone meal into the soil, but I have since switched to granular chicken manure. I apply this organic fertilizer both in the planting holes and on the soil surface. This helps to avoid attracting critters that dig up and remove the bulbs. In newly dug borders, my practice is now to plant lilies at least three feet away from peonies and other perennials, allowing ample space for future expansion.
Time has done its work: many of the older borders now host mature stands that rise well above shorter peonies and neighbouring perennials. I have even begun dividing some of these established clumps, extending their beauty into newer borders.
At their peak, the lilies transform the garden in a way that is difficult to translate into images. Their height, rhythm, and sheer abundance are best appreciated in person. Photographs hint at the scene, but never fully convey the atmosphere created by these mature plantings. This post highlights newer varieties, distinct from a previous blog post, revealing how the lily season now rivals the peony display in presence and impact.
Classifying lilies
The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) classifies Lilium (true lilies) into nine distinct divisions based on parentage, flower shape, and orientation to aid gardeners. These divisions, established in 1964, range from early-blooming Asiatic hybrids to fragrant oriental types, making selection easier based on hardiness, scent, and bloom time. The Lily Group of the RHS is also responsible for registering new cultivars.
The first to come: Asiatic lilies
From June up to mid-July, Asiatic lilies bloom, some overlapping with late-blooming peonies. My new obsession is the new pollenless Asiatic. I plan to add new ones this spring.
‘Apricot Fudge’ is probably the most unusual lily in the garden. It is the result of a cross between the longiflorum and asiatic lilies, a hybrid of Division VIII called LA. Its thick, waxy tepals are strongly recurved and twisted, giving each flower a sculptural, almost abstract appearance. The honey apricot tones, often brushed with hints of caramel and green, make it a true curiosity, more admired up close than from afar, and always a conversation starter in the border.
Then the oriental lilies
From mid-July to late August, oriental lilies provide colours and fragrance. Here are some of the new blooms of 2025.
ORIENPET AND OTHER HYBRIDS
Orienpet (oriental x Asiatic) and other interdivisional hybrids occupy a special place in the modern lily garden. Given time, they reveal their full potential: tall, commanding plants crowned with intensely fragrant, extraordinary blooms that define the height of lily season. For this reason, some online nurseries refer to them as “tree lilies.”
Here are some newer additions not shown before.
Already Looking Forward to the 2026 Blooms
Over the years, lily season has become one of the moments I most look forward to in the garden. It is also why some visitors choose to come at this peak, when the lilies stand tall, fill the air with fragrance, and reveal just how extraordinary the garden has become.
And once again, I find myself planning a new peony border—fully aware that it will, inevitably, be filled with lilies. I am still “deciding,” which in gardening terms means two or three online carts are already full and awaiting their fate. All while hoping that 2026 will once again be a year of the lilies in my peony garden.
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