If your garden looks straight out to sea, you already know the rules are different. Salt arrives on the wind rather than in the soil, the earth is often thin, sandy or full of shingle, and there is rarely a mature tree to take the sting out of a gale. The good news is that the plants that thrive in these conditions are some of the most characterful in the garden — and once they have settled in, a front-line border is one of the lowest-maintenance plantings you can make.

What the front line does to a plant

Coastal exposure attacks plants in three ways. Salt spray draws moisture out of leaves and buds, causing scorched, blackened tips on the windward side. Wind battering tears soft growth and rocks shallow-rooted plants loose. And thin, free-draining soils leach away nutrients and dry out within days of rain.

The survivors share a look. They tend to have small, leathery, waxy or felted leaves, deep or fleshy roots, and stems that bend rather than snap. Choose plants with those features and you will spend your summers looking at the garden instead of replacing it.

Perennials that shrug off salt spray

These are the reliable ones — plants I would put within ten metres of the shoreline without a second thought.

• Sea thrift (Armeria maritima) — tight cushions of grassy green topped with pink pom-poms from late spring. It loves gravel, tolerates footfall and never sulks after a storm.
• Sea holly (Eryngium x oliverianum and E. giganteum) — steely blue, thistle-like heads on stiff stems. The foliage is naturally leathery, and the seedheads hold their colour into winter.
• Euphorbia characias subsp. wulfenii — architectural grey-blue stems with lime-green flower heads in spring. Give it sharp drainage and it will seed gently around the border.
• Red valerian (Centranthus ruber) — will grow out of a wall, a shingle bank or a crack in the path. Deadhead it if you want fewer seedlings, or leave it if you like the loose, cottagey effect.
• Crocosmia 'Lucifer' — brilliant scarlet flowers in late summer on stems that stay upright in wind. Divide clumps every few years to keep the flowering strong.
• Kniphofia — the smaller, slimmer varieties such as 'Little Maid' or 'Bees' Sunset' handle exposure far better than the fat old-fashioned hybrids.
• Nepeta x faassenii — soft grey foliage and a long season of blue flowers. It flops a little in wind, so plant it where it can spill over a low wall or path edge.
• Stachys byzantina — lamb's ears. The felted leaves are a natural salt barrier, and the silvery colour lifts any seaside scheme.

Plants for skeletal, wind-scoured soil

Where the soil is little more than sand over shingle, you need plants that expect drought and poor fertility. Feed them too kindly and they will grow soft and floppy — the opposite of what you want.

• Sedum (Hylotelephium) 'Herbstfreude' — fleshy leaves, flat pink flower heads that feed bees late into autumn, then stand as dark seedheads all winter.
• Lavender — Lavandula angustifolia varieties such as 'Hidcote' are happiest in poor, gritty ground and full sun.
• Sea lavender (Limonium platyphyllum) — airy sprays of tiny flowers on wiry stems. Excellent for cutting and completely unbothered by wind.
• Dianthus — pinks with grey foliage and clove-scented flowers. Plant them high and dry, ideally on a slight mound or against a warm wall.
• Lychnis coronaria — downy silver stems and magenta flowers. Short-lived but generous with seedlings.
• Erigeron karvinskianus — Mexican fleabane. It will thread itself through steps, walls and gravel, flowering for months.

Group them, and other design tactics

A single plant on an exposed site is a target. Groups are more than a design device — they shelter one another, so the middle of a clump experiences a fraction of the wind that hits the outside. Plant in threes, fives or sevens, and repeat the same plant at intervals along the border so the eye reads rhythm rather than chaos.

Keep the planting low and layered at the front, then allow the tallest, most flexible plants behind. Verbena bonariensis and the taller grasses bend and recover; stiff, brittle stems break and leave a hole. A low, wind-permeable hedge of griselinia, escallonia or olearia set back from the border will filter the wind far better than a solid fence, which simply forces it over the top in a damaging curl.

Gravel mulch is worth the expense. It stops rain splashing salty soil onto low foliage, keeps weeds down and reflects light up into the planting on dull days.

Getting them in and keeping them going

Autumn planting is the single best thing you can do. The soil is still warm, winter rain does the watering for you, and roots get a head start before the drying winds of spring. Water thoroughly through the first summer, then ease off — these plants resent coddling more than they resent drought.

Feed sparingly with a seaweed-based tonic in spring rather than a nitrogen-rich fertiliser, which only encourages soft, sappy growth. Cut back flattened stems after a gale, but leave seedheads standing through winter where you can: they provide food for birds, structure in the border and, on a grey January day, a reminder of why you chose this spot in the first place.