Goals: Biodiversity

Yellow chandeliers in May, when the city most needs something to look at.

The flame tree of Indian summers; fast, spectacular and shallow-rooted.

Orchid-like flowers in February, and buds that go into the north-Indian kitchen.

Compact evergreen with flower heads butterflies work all morning.

Neat glossy shrub with pinwheel white flowers; the easiest good hedge there is.

Orange jessamine — flushes of scented white flowers after every rain.

Opens at four in the afternoon and self-sows itself around the garden.

The most reliable cut flower for an Indian summer terrace.

A fortnight of spectacle and then a head of seed the birds will take.

Flowers every day of the year and asks for nothing. Indigenous to the deccan.