20 Best Scented Shrubs and Plants

Choiysa is an evergreen shrub with glossy leaves and a rich, sweet scent, flowering in early summer from mid-May onwards. It is also known as Mexican orange blossom because of its lovely scent. Choiysa is easy to grow and unfussy about soil conditions. Illustrated is c. Aztec pearl, which will grow up to around 2.5m.

Buddleja is a deciduous shrub, which is perhaps more correctly described as aromatic rather than scented. Its place on this list is also because it is a butterfly magnet, providing nectar for butterflies, bees and pollinators. An easy-to-grow summer-flowering shrub.  

A mature Wisteria is a spectacular climbing plant, with long mauve or white raceme flowers. It is an eye-catching, here is a short video of wonderful wisteria in full bloom. Wisteria has a powerful scent. I grew it on the back of the house and the scent wasted everywhere in the breeze.

It is not the easiest of climbing plants to grow. Advice about growing Wisteria and a video on how to prune Wisteria, which is important to keep it flowering each year.

Honeysuckle is a woodland climbing plant with a sweet scent. There are both summer and winter flowering varieties, and both deciduous and semi-evergreen.

Planting position is important. As a woodland plant, it likes its roots in the shade and its head in the sun. Some varieties are more scented than others. Information on the best varieties to grow for summer scent. There is also the most wonderfully perfumed Winter flowering Honeysuckle, which arguably has the best scent of all. 

Lavender is a summer flowering perennial, and illustrated is Lavandula angustifolia, often called English lavender. This variety L. Hidcote, is hardier, in contrast with L. stoechas, the French Lavender, which is not fully hardy. There are many shades and sizes of lavender and varying degrees of hardiness. I like to plant Lavender alongside a pathway so that as you brush past the lavender, you release the scent.

For images of types of lavender, hardy information and how to make a lavender path.

Another easy-to-grow shrub with wonderful scented flowers is Philadelphus. It is deciduous and vigorous, growing up to around 2.5m which means it needs a fair amount of space in the border.

Philadelphus flowers in spring and early summer and makes a great addition to a mixed shrub border.

Tips on growing Philadelphus.

There are several scented varieties of Clematis, probably the most well known is Clematis montana 'Elizabeth' illustrated is Rubens, which has vanilla scented flowers.

C. Montana is vigorous, May flowering and Pruning group 1 which makes it one of the easier Clematis to grow. Tips about growing Clematis, including Montana Elizabeth. So many new Clematis are being brought to the market, which means new scented varieties are being developed all the time, and it is worth searching them out.

 Nepeta, common name Cat Mint, is a summer flowering aromatic perennial and a much better plant than it gets credit for. Aromatic, attractive to bees and able to grow almost anywhere, it makes a soft blue cloud of colour. Nepeta is ideal in blue colour planting schemes where, for example, Lavender will not tolerate the conditions. 

There is also a very attractive upright variety, called Nepeta parnassica which is native to Greece, upright, clump forming with strong blue/lilac flowers. It shares all the other characteristics of Nepeta, save for flowering a little later in the summer.

Some Viburnum are highly scented and there are both evergreen and deciduous varieties. Viburnums are easy shrubs to grow, and which required little or no maintenance. This variety x carlcephalum has dozens of very scented snowball like flowers in early spring,  tips on growing Viburnum

Winter Flowering Honeysuckle,  Latin name Lonicera fragrantissima  flowers from mid-December through to March and has very sweetly scented small white flowers.

True to say that the winter flowering honeysuckle has a knockout scent, one of the best. 

We don't always connect scent with Rhododendrons, but there are some scented Rhododendrons.  Illustrated is Rhododendron luteum, one of the most popular. It has a sweet fragrance that flowers in the spring. In common with all Rhododendrons, R. luteum needs to be planted in acid soil and will tolerate semi shade. It is easy to grow and trouble free. 

Sarcococca, common name Sweet box, is a winter flowering, shade tolerant low-growing shrub, 30-90cm.

Although the flowers look insignificant, they pack a powerful scent and make a lovely, low growing hedge.

Sarcococca is a valuable shrub because it is so very shade tolerant making it suitable for difficult corners of the garden. How to grow Sarcococca.

Lily is a showy, powerfully scented summer flowering bulb. Check out growing advice to pick the best scented Lily flowers for your garden, as not all of them have a fragrance.

Lilies thrive in containers and bring a stylish and wonderfully scented statement to a patio. 

The taller varieties may require some support and watchout for the Lily Beetle. (when you find it a squish with your fingers, is best.)

When thinking about scented plants daffodils often get overlooked. Whilst some daffodils have a light scent, there are group of Narcissus which are highly perfumed. Illustrated is N. 'Fragrant Rose' and there is a good selected of very scented bulbs available.

Scented narcissus is ideal planted with wallflowers and Hyacinth also scented for a spring bulb display, which packs a powerful punch of scent as well.

Sweet Peas are a highly scented annual, which means they grow, flower and finish in one year. A highly perfumed climbing plant, which adds height and scent to a border. In a good summer, Sweet Peas has a long flowering period from June to October. The downside is that sweet peas need a lot of attention.

Lots of advice about  growing Sweet Peas

The brightly coloured spring flowers of Erysimum cheiri Cheiranthus also known as wallflowers, have a powerful sweet scent.

They make great spring bedding displays. Many Wallflowers are biennial and short-lived, it's not uncommon to treat them as bedding and replace each year. Some are more scented than others - find out which are best to buy for scent.

Monarda is a herbaceous summer flowering perennial with aromatic leaves and very attractive to bees. It is clump forming, and illustrated is M.Squaw. The only drawback is that it is a relatively short-lived perennial, but well worth growing, not least to help the bees. Its common name is Bee Balm.  

This is Trachelospermum jasminoides an excellent climbing plant which is easy to grow, evergreen and has wonderfully scented white flowers. It is hardy in most of the UK H4 and sweet-scented flowers.

It will reach up to around 2.5 at maturity and is self clinging.