8 Fall Container Plants to Dress Up Your Front Porch

Ornamental Pepper

Ornamental peppers (Capsicum annuum) are easy-to-maintain plants that like full sun and are heat and drought-tolerant. Some of these annuals have striking foliage with a pop of vibrant red, orange, yellow, or black fruit. Look for these varieties to decorate the front of your home:

• Basket of Fire: Produces loads of small, long hot peppers and is cool weather tolerant. 
• Black Pearl: Boasts dark purple, almost-black leaves in full sun with clusters of pearl-like, shiny peppers that turn red when ripe.
• Calico: Showy variegated purple/cream/green tricolor foliage and glossy black peppers that are very spicy.
• Purple Flash: Heat-tolerant with striking flashes of bright purple foliage on almost-black leaves. The fruit is small, glossy, and black.
• Santos Orange: Grows in a smaller, bushy form with bright orange peppers.

Ornamental Cabbage and Kale

Ornamental cabbages and kale are perfect for fall because their colors intensify as the weather becomes cooler. These bold plants add texture and rich color to containers. Cabbages are low and full while kale adds height so they make a great pair when planted together. While part of the same plant family as the broccoli, cabbage, and kale we enjoy in meals, cultivars with colored leaves are considered ornamental and not edible. Mix and match these varieties to find the perfect color combination for your front porch.

• Coral Prince: Creamy white center surrounded by feathery green leaves.
• Coral Queen: Deep red center surrounded by green leaves.
• Nagoya: Red, white, or rose centers with fringed purplish-green leaves.
• Sparrow Red: Large, 1 to 1.5-foot-wide rosette of red leaves surrounded by fringed green leaves.
• Sparrow White: Large, 1 to 1.5-foot-wide rosette with a cream-colored center surrounded by fringed green leaves.
• Nagoya Garnish Red: Ornamental kale with frilly leaves.
• Lacinato: Upright dark blue leaves and often called dinosaur, Toscano, or Tuscan kale.
  

Chrysanthemum

Grocery stores, big box stores, and garden centers stock gold, yellow, orange, pink, burgundy, and white chrysanthemums every fall to decorate front steps. While it's tempting to pick the potted mum with the most color, choose the plant with the most buds rather than open flowers to make sure they last throughout the season. Then, repot the mum in a larger container with well-draining soil for the healthiest plant.

While most people treat mums as an annual to be discarded at the end of the season, they are perennials that can often be overwintered to plant in the spring. Cut back the foliage and place the pots in a sheltered location. In the spring, plant them in a warm, sunny spot in the garden.

New England Aster

If you like blues and purples, New England Asters (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae) are a great choice for large containers. The plants grow 3 to 5 feet tall with fuzzy stems, hairy leaves, and large, purple flowers with a yellow center from August to October. Once you change your front porch decor, save the plants for planting in the garden next spring. Cut back the stems and store the potted plants in a sheltered spot.

Hylotelephium

Most often known by the common name of sedum or stonecrop, Hylotelephium is a genus of succulent herbaceous perennials known for their heat and drought tolerance. A fall-blooming standard is Autumn Joy (Hylotelephium 'Herbstfreude') with fleshy green leaves and purple-pink blooms on 12-24 inch stems. Look for other varieties with unique foliage and a variety of colors.

• Japanese stonecrop (Hylotelephium sieboldii): Pink flowers. Cool weather turns the blue-green foliage into bright shades of orange and red.
• Showy stonecrop (Hylotelephium spectabile 'Iceberg'): Pale green fleshy leaves with bright white flowers.
• Life everlasting stonecrop (Hylotelephium telephium 'Xenox Yellow'): Dark plum leaves with peach-apricot flowers.

Heuchera

Heuchera, commonly called coral bells, is a hardy perennial in USDA growing zones 3 to 9. The genus has more than 50 species, each with bold, colorful foliage. The mounding plant stands alone or compliments other plants thanks to a range of foliage colors and textures. Pick your favorite among these varieties:

• Amber Waves: Amber-colored foliage that darkens through the season.
• Canyon Belle: Clusters of bright red flowers above green foliage.
• Citronella: Showy citron yellow leaves with a silver underside.
• Green Spice: Green leaves with dark purple veins that turn amber in the fall.
• Palace Purple: Olive green to deep purple foliage with a dark wine-red on the underside of the leaf.

Ornamental Grass

Ornamental grasses add movement, texture, and color to a container. Choices range from mounding blue fescue to tall, waving purple fountaingrass. The grasses can be transplanted to the garden when the season is over.

• Purple fountaingrass (Cenchrus setaceus): Deep, reddish-purple arching foliage with bristled seed heads.
• Hameln dwarf fountaingrass (Cenchrus alopecuroides 'Hameln'): Green foliage with short bottle-brush-shaped seed heads and highly resistant to deer grazing. 
• Japanese Hakone grass (Hakoenchloa macra 'Aureola'): Yellow leaves with a narrow green stripe near the leaf margin and a cascading habit like a golden waterfall over the sides of containers.
  

Pansy

Pansies (Viola x wittrockiana) are the quintessential flower for cooler weather. The range of colors, patterns, and sizes offers the perfect look for your porch containers. The plants can bloom for up to four to six months and are upright or trailing. Cool Wave pansies in yellow, purple, or a combination of dark purple, white, and a yellow center are a 6- to 8-inch tall, spreading, trailing variety that can reach 30 inches wide.