The Garden-Favorite Flower You Should Plant With Crepe Myrtles For Gorgeous Blooms

Flowering trees and shrubs are a great way to bring blooms to your landscape with little effort. Crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia spp.) is one of the most colorful and romantic flowering trees available. Despite the beauty you can bring to your yard with a crepe myrtle tree alone, pairing it with flowering shrubs is a great way to add even more color. Spirea is one of the best flowering crepe myrtle companion shrubs around.

Both spirea and crepe myrtle are native to Asia, with spirea hailing from Japan and China and crepe myrtle native to southeastern Asia, as well as India and Australia. Despite not being native to the United States, both plants perform well in much of North America, without becoming invasive or overly aggressive. Even better, the blooms of these species are popular with pollinators, meaning you won't just be enjoying beautiful flowers, you'll also be helping your local bees and butterflies.

Because both crepe myrtles and spireas thrive in well-draining soil, it's easy to have them in the same part of your garden. Crepe myrtles require full sun, and while spireas prefer full sun, you don't have to worry if your crepe myrtle occasionally casts some shade on the shrub. Spireas can also handle a bit of shade.

Spireas can thrive in USDA zones 3 through 9, depending on the specific cultivar, and crepe myrtles are hardy in zones 6 through 9, so there is significant overlap in the areas where they grow. Both plants are impressively tolerant of drought and pollution, as well. This makes crepe myrtles and spireas perfect options for challenging spots where many other flowering trees and shrubs might falter.

Both spirea and crepe myrtle come in a range of sizes and have a variety of flower shapes and colors. While crepe myrtles are generally taller than spireas, some cultivars, like 'Bicolor' are as short as 4 feet, making them the same size, or even shorter than many spirea. 'Bicolor' crepe myrtle could be the perfect option if you don't have a lot of space in your yard and don't want to be forced to commit 'crepe murder' by pruning your crepe myrtle back too aggressively. You could plant it next to a taller spirea like 'Lanceolata' or 'Renaissance' which will grow to similar heights, or put a shorter spirea like 'Goldflame' or 'Bailcarol' in front of it for a more layered effect.

You can also opt to grow spirea and crepe myrtles with similar colored flowers, or you can pair a white flowering crepe myrtle like 'Natchez' with a pink flowering spirea like 'Dolchia'. Both crepe myrtles and spireas have some spring blooming cultivars and some varieties that bloom later. Combinations of just these two plants can potentially provide you with months of blooms, depending on which species you choose. You can even add an additional layer of color in your garden by planting shorter flowers in front of your shrubs. Using summer annuals as a colorful living mulch is a great way to both pack more color into your garden and also suppress weeds.