I have a space to fill in our front, north facing garden along the side of our front porch. It receives little direct sunlight, (barely any until closer to June), and thus is moist most of the time (not soggy though). I am looking for an evergreen shrub that doesn't have too wide of a spread (e.g. 2-3 feet diameter, height can be up to 5 or 6 feet but doesn't have to go that high). I already have small rhodos (with yellow flowers) and cornus alba (if I didn't damage them when cutting them back hard this spring). Slower growing would be preferred, since I don't know a heck of a lot about pruning yet (or else a shrub that would be very forgiving of a newby pruner!). Flowering or not, doesn't matter if it has interesting foliage. Any suggestions? I'm off to a garden centre or two to see their opinions, but thought I'd check with the experts here as well. Thanks in advance!
Yellow variegated forms of a Aucuba japonica can be planted behind red-twigged forms of Cornus alba for color contrast.
Nandina should do well, (Heavenly Bamboo) not a true bamboo... very graceful, flowers and remains mostly evergreen unless it is minus 17 celsius....
I suggest Pyracantha (Firethorn). It has white flowers in the spring, gorgeous bright berries in the fall, and it'll grow anywhere--sun, shade, damp, dry. Best of all it can be trained to a trellis or espallied to whatever shape you want. If you build a sturdy rectangular trellis or tuteur and tie the branches along it, you'll just need to prune it as it gets "out of bounds". It has dark glossy leaves that will look beautiful during your mild west coast winters. When I grew the plant here in Ontario there was always some leaf damage in the winter, but you'll have no trouble, I'm sure.
I've got a number of boxwoods doing fairly well in mostly shaded situations around my place. I don't really know much about their cultural requirements, but they make a nice textural contrast with everything else.
