Goals: Flowers & beauty

A woody climber with fringed white-and-yellow flowers and a heavy sweet scent.

Fat red flowers on a bare grey trunk, then pods of cotton that blow down every street.

The true ashoka — orange flower clusters on a small shade-loving tree of wet forest.

The narrow green column planted along every Indian driveway and boundary wall.

The plane tree of Kashmir, planted for four centuries and unmistakable in autumn.

Bare branches and orange claws of flower in February — the tree that announces Holi.

A big orange-flowered climber of central forest, dramatic on a strong pergola.

A scrambling hill plant whose root gives a lasting red dye.

The mehndi hedge of the dry west — scented flowers and dye leaves.

The silver-plumed grass of autumn riverbanks — Durga Puja in plant form.