A lot of cool ideas here from a garden show in your area.

I also found this interesting suggestion in a discussion of good window box choices in northern New Jersey:

You can also use perennials or some tropicals in your boxes. I've done Lirope & Heuchera mixed w/ trailers like sweet potato vine, trailing coleus, summer wave torenia. (creeping jenny ~lysmachia will give a nice effect). Dichondra,polka dot plant, Croton and types of Carex can also handle shade with periods of sun. It's not the same look as the picture, but you have lots of options.

If it were me, though, TPS, I'd go hang around at a good local nursery and have a heart to heart with one of the folks there.

Wow those boxes are beautiful!

There are plenty of local nurseries- we are the Garden State after all :) I bought a bleeding heart plant the other night and they were kind enough to pot it for me!

This is the one I like. I was at the Fort Lee location the other night; was hoping to make it out to the farm anyway to show O the chickens so maybe a trip with my windowbox would be worthwhile as well.

I can ask my husband, who worked at a nursery for years. But impatiens ring a bell as what he told me to plant in my window boxes when we were dating.

By "told" I mean "recommended." I just made him sound very bossy. :)

Impatiens are annuals. But gorgeous, and very hardy and undeterred by shade. When I had outdoor baskets, I loved planting them every season with flowering annuals, but I think TPS is looking for perennials.

On Wikipedia it says that there are annual and perennial varieties, but maybe perennial versions are hard to find, I don't know.

Yes, definitely both: http://homeguides.sfgate.com/impatiens-perennials-75044.html

See if there's something hardy up there that attracts butterflies and hummingbirds. O will enjoy them.

I think the key is to get 3 categories of plants for the box (get ready this is gonna be real scientific)

1. Droopies
These can be ivy or sweet potato vine or periwinkle or wintercreeper or creeping jenny. The point is that they come over the front of the box and make it feel deeper/longer.

2. Cool leaves
Something that isn't only pretty when it is in flower, like with variegated leaves or colored leaves.
examples: coleus, spider plant, heuchara, golden yucca.

3. Flowers
I like flowers that have more than 1 color so you are getting lots of bang for your small space.
examples: Lantana, mini daffodils that are white and yellow, portulaca (my fav), petunias.

Also put some sweet alyssum in there. It grows easily, has tons of seeds so it comes back well, and it smells good and attracts butterflies.

Ugh. Gross. Nothing is going to be grown in that box because it's ugly. It will be tossed.