Create a Twinkling Night Blooming Garden with Flowers that Bloom at Night and Enchanted Lighting

When spring arrives and the weather starts to warm, we look forward to spending more time outdoors. Evenings and warm summer nights can be so luxurious and we like to get the most out of those lovely temperate evenings. You can enjoy your day longer when you create a dreamy twinkling night-blooming garden with fragrant flowers that reflect the moon and decorative garden lighting.

Create a Twinkling Night Blooming Garden with flowers that bloom at night and twinkle lights. DiscoverCreateInspire.com

Table of Contents

First, Use Flowers and Plants that are Pretty at Night
Second, Add Lighting to your Outdoor Nighttime Twinkling Garden, Patio or Deck

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First, Use Flowers and Plants that are Pretty at Night

To grow a night garden you will want to include plants with white blossoms as well as night-blooming plants. White flowers and variegated leaves reflect the moonlight and garden lighting especially well, so they are perfect for your Flowering Nighttime Twinkling Garden. In the lists below I share

plants with white blossoms that are open all day and night
plants that only bloom at night
plants that release their scent more at night
variegated plants with white on the leaves

Many of these can be planted in pots which will make it much easier if you want to over-winter the tender perennials indoors or place them where you want without doing major landscaping changes.

When choosing plants, consider when they will be blooming and plant a variety of plants so that you have blooms all summer long. Also, consider their height so that you can plant shorter plants on the borders and taller plants toward the back of the flower bed. In addition, consider how much they will fill out so as to not overcrowd the other plants.

Lastly, know what temperatures and lighting the plants need. Make sure the plants can tolerate the low and high temperatures of your region if they are perennials. You can check your USA Hardiness Zone here. Make sure that sun-loving plants get at least six hours of full sun each day and that shade-loving plants get less than four hours of shade, preferably in the morning.

Night Blooming Flowering Plants

This is a list of plants that bloom only in the evening or nighttime. If there are special varieties that work best, I have listed them. If they come in multiple colors, choose white so that it reflects the moon and your garden lighting.

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Datura, Datura meteloides Tender perennial. The Horn of Plenty variety is hardy to zone 6. Others can be grown as an annual to zone 7 and perennial in warmer climates. Please note that while beautiful, all parts of this plant are toxic.
Pale Evening Primrose blooms in late spring and can get 3-5 feet tall.
Casa Blanca Lily hardy in zones 5-10. While it likes full sun, it will do well with afternoon shade if you have hot summers. Fragrant.
Four O’Clocks Mirabilis jalapa, grows to 2-4 feet high and blooms from mid-summer to frost. Likes full to partial sun. While technically they are perennial in zones 9-11, I have seen them die back and return each year in zone 7. Fragrant.
Nicotiania, Nicotiana alata ‘Jasmine’ or Nicotiana sylvestres ( Annual) Blooms at night and are fragrant. While both are annuals in cooler climates than zone 10-11, they usually reseed themselves and so return the following year. They like full to partial shade.
Dragon Fruit Cactus, Hylocereus undatus, also grows the dragon fruit or pitaya. Tender Perennial that grows as an annual in zones 9-11. If you want to grow them in cooler zones, plant them in a pot and bring them in when the temperatures will be below 40 degrees. The fragrance smells of citrus.
Easter Lily Cactus blooms during the springtime at night with the flowers closing in the day, it likes full to part shade and is easy to care for. Hardy down to 20 degrees.
Rain Lily, Zephyranthes drummondii grow best where they get afternoon shade in zones 7-11. Blossoms are known to open in the evening after a rain from summer through fall.
Queen of the Night Cactus, Epiphyllum oxypetalum, is a tender perennial. Hardy in zones 10-11, these plants can be grown in pots and moved indoors in cooler climates. The blossoms bloom for one night releasing their fragrance. Needs afternoon shade.
Evening stock (Matthiola longipetala), is a hardy annual. The flowers are not super showy, but the scent, which is released at night, is lovely.
Moonflower likes the heat and is best grown in zones 9-11. It’s a climbing vine that would look pretty on a trellis.

Fragrant Flowers that Smell Divine at Night

White Gardenia adds fragrance to your night time garden. — Gardenia

Gardenia augusta smells delicious all day but even more at night. Blooms from late spring to early summer.
Angel’s Trumpets, Brugmansia – A tender perennial have lovely white trumpet flowers.
Night Phlox Zaluzianskya capensis (annual) releases its fragrance at night.
Night Blooming Jasmine, Cestrum nocturnum, blooms in the evenings all through the warm season. Tender perennial.
Chocolate Daisy Berlandiera lyrata blooms at night and releases a chocolatey scent all night. Hardy to zone 5.
Tuberose Polianthes tuberosa A tender bulb that will only survive the winter in zone 8 or higher. Can reach four feet tall.

White flowers to reflect the moonlight in your night garden — Angel’s Trumpets

More Easy-to-Grow White Flowering Plants That Reflect Light in Your Night Garden

These lovely white flowers stay open all day and night, so be sure and mix some of these in your flower beds to have flowers blossoming in the day as well as flowers to reflect the lights at night.

Yucca
White Lilacs
Foam Flower, Tiarella cordifolia, likes the shade and is low growing making it nice to plant neart the walkway. Easy to grow from seed and returns each year.
Sweet Alyssum
Shasta Daisy
White Lobelia is nice for cascading down the edges of containers
White Azalea Bush
Lily of the Valley Shrub likes mostly shade
White Peonies
White Roses
White Petunias, is an annual that is easy to grow and blooms all summer. It has a lovely fragrance and the trailing type works great for a hanging basket.
White Hydrangea Bush has big white, long-lasting snowball-looking bunches of flowers.
White Butterfly Bush will bloom all summer long and attract moths and butterflies. Very easy to grow.

Variegated Plants That Reflect the Moon and Accent Lighting

Variegated plants and shrubs often don’t have showy flowers, but the leaves will reflect the light and add interest to your night flower garden.

Variegated Hostas work well in the shade.
Brunnera has pretty green and white heart-shaped leaves.
Tri-color Sage
Daphne (Daphne x burkwoodii ‘Briggs Moonlight’) grows 3-4 feet tall and 3-6 feet wide, zones 5-8

Variegated leaves reflect the moonlight — Hosta

Second, Add Lighting to your Outdoor Nighttime Twinkling Garden, Patio or Deck

Now to create the ambiance for your Twinkling Night Blooming Garden, focus on the most important element and that is the lighting. By mixing the types of lights you add texture, depth, and interest to your area. If possible and depending on the space you are decorating, you will want:

pathway lighting or
lights for your deck posts.
String lights for the plants, bushes, and trees for depth and definition to the plant shapes.
Draping star-, flower-, or bulb lights can help to define the space.
If you don’t have enough trees or bushes to add height, consider artificial lighted trees.
Light-up solar flowers are a fun touch, too.
Then you can also consider stand-alone lights like a lighted sculpture, lantern, or hanging pendant light.

Brighten Your Home’s Exterior at Night with Our Solar Light Collection at Plow & Hearth!

If you’ve been to this article before, you will notice that I had to remove the photos of the products from Plow and Hearth. I left my recommended list of garden and patio accents perfect to create a night blooming garden. You could also click the link below to be taken to Plow and Hearth’s Garden Accent’s page.

String Lights

Solar Star String Lights

Color Changing Solar Bee Lights

Solar String Lights with 100 or 200 lights can be woven in between the branches of your bushes. No worries about turning them on and off.

Twinkle Lights with Timer. Wrapping your tree trunks with twinkle lights adds dimension to your garden space.

Color-Changing Flower Lights. If you want to add color to your Night Time Twinkle Garden, these lights will do the trick.

Solar Ball String Lights

Lighted Trees

Lighted Eucalyptus Tree with 136 lights adds height to your Twinkle Garden. Stake it to the ground or place it it a pot and cover with Spanish moss.

Lighted Birch Trees

Lighted Olive Trees

Faux Boxwood Topiary Sphere, Topiaries, Cones and Wreath There’s no pruning or watering with these faux shrubs. Just put into your choice of planter and add string lights.