My Garden

For the very last post in my coverage of the new plants seen at the Chelsea Flower Show this year, here's my final list. It contains an amazing one hundred and twelvr (yes, 112) new plants.

I've taken all the announcements in the press releases with a bucket of salt, poked around the show for a few days, talked to lots of people, done some checking and come up with this list. Some great new plants this year, many of them discussed in the previous posts here starting on 1 May. If I hear of more, or discover that any are not new after all, I'll amend this list so it will always be the most up-to-date version.

(Sorry, life's just too short to put in all the italics for the botanical names!

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In the run up to the Chelsea Flower Show and for the last week since I took my first look at the show as it was being set up, I've been blogging about the new plants. Thirty four posts in all, plus eight in the run up to the show. But here's the thing: what do we mean by "new", exactly?

For the purposes of this series of Chelsea posts, a new plant is one that has not been available before or seen before. The RHS Plant Finder is a very helpful reference in this respect.

It's true that discussing a plant like the white form of Streptocarpus gardenii on the City of Durban stand is more interesting than useful as it will be some years before it's available to gardeners to buy. But having only recently been discovered in the wild there's no disputing that it's new. By contrast, you could order the new roses at the show itself although for them too it was a first sighting.

A rather less rigid definition of new, a definition which serves nurseries' marketing and sales effort more than accuracy, covers a plant which a nursery may have on display for the first time or in its catalogue for the first time - even though other nurseries have been selling it for a while or even for many years.

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The world famous French iris nursery Cayeux has been showing irises at the Chelsea Flower Show for a few years ago. But, up till now, their exhibits have been disappointing.They grow their show plants in England and this year, for the first time, their irises were grown for the show by Woottens of Wenhaston in Suffolk - and the quality has improved noticeably.

As you'll see from my report on the Cayeux new 2009 introductions, they planned to have three new irises, all raised by Richard Cayeux, at the show. In the event, not all were open by opening day, but one of them looked spectacular.

‘Coeur d'Or', on a prominent corner of the exhibit, stopped people in their tracks. It really is a dramatic plant. The ruffled upright standards are pure white, the ruffled falls are the same pure shade but with a bold true blue edge with the white seeping into the blue. Then, in the throat of the flower, a golden flash - hence the name.

Derived from the similar but much paler ‘Elegant', which features a lavender edge, this is a good grower, with healthy foliage and just so dramatic. I'm told 'Nuits de Noces' and 'Bel Avenir' opened later in the week.

Plants can be ordered direct from Cayeux Irises or from their British agent, Viv Marsh Postal Plants

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I was surprised by the wealth of attractive but unfamiliar chrysanthemums on the Chelsea Flower Show display staged by Graeme Iddon. A lovely colour-coordinated display featuring what for gardeners are unfamiliar chrysanths, they should prove easy to grow and valuable cut flowers.

These are all bred as commercial cut flowers, so you may have seen them in bouquets before now, but I've not seen plants on sale anywhere.

In particular I was impressed by ‘Dance', a cross involving an older variety, ‘Augusta', made by Yoder Brothers, one of the world's leading chrysanthemum breeders in California. The result is a dramatic spoon type - that is with the lower part of each petal rolled into a tube and the tip flattened out to reveal the colour. The result is a dramatic white centred vivid pink flower. It was shown arranged with Eryngium ‘Supernova Starlight', another newcomer. Impressive newcomer seen as a cut flower but not as plants at the moment.

Other chrysanths on show that I'd never seen before, and I admired most of them on Graeme Iddon's Silver Medal winning display I have to say, include ‘Anastasia Pink Improved', ‘Artistry Pink Improved', ‘Asenka Splendid', ‘Bacardi Pearl', ‘Biarritz', ‘Le Man', ‘Pink Lollipop', ‘Posh Pink', ‘Regan Improved' and ‘Santini Pink'.

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There show's over, and a great show it was, sell-off was late yesterday afternoon - but news of new plants keeps on coming. Just so you know... three more batches of newcomers and then a long list of every one.

Now, there are more new roses from Harkness Roses than from anyone else. I took a look at their spectacular Persian Mystery series a few days ago, but there are more - four more, in fact. All four have interesting connections.

In support of the Equity Benevolent Fund, the celebrities were out in force to support Equity (‘Harplayer'), the rose whose sales will support actors with financial hardship or special needs. A classic Floribunda rose, clusters of unusually pretty buds open to sprays of up to seven pink, beautifully fragrant, slightly ruffled blooms with peachy overtones. They're likely to be more vivid pink when not specially encouraged to flower for the show. Equity (‘Harplayer') is prolific with a long season and is good in mixed borders, as a low hedge or in more traditional rose beds

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Winners of sixty four Chelsea Flower Show Gold Medals, and famous for introducing new plants since the inception of the nursery in 1864, Hillier Nurseries have introduced a grand total of more than 230 new varieties over the years - with two more this year.

Pride of place go to two dramatic new multicoloured cordylines, ‘Southern Splendour', which I discussed before the show opened, and ‘Sunrise' - both are members of the Kaleidoscope Series and there are more to come in this range.

‘Sunrise' is a more relaxed in the way it holds its foliage than the relatively upright ‘Southern Splendour'. Each leaf has a rather creamy central stripe along the leaf with stripes of vivid pink and bronze shades. The whole effect is not only of a more arching plant, but also of cleaner lines in its stripes. ‘Southern Splendour' also has a pinker colouration.

Grow ‘Sunrise' is a container and choose companion plants according to taste - bright impatiens, cool grey foliage, many heucheras would tone in well.

Cordylines are relatively drought tolerant, so if you're depending on this feature be sure to choose companion plantings with similar tolerances

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The exhibits staged by Penhow Nurseries (no website) at the Chelsea Flower Show are always simple and dramatic and always feature just two South African genera - Diascia and Nemesia. This year they won their sixth Gold medal in the ten years they've been at Chelsea and also launched a new Diascia.

The latest in their series of dwarf diascias, ‘Little Dazzler' is a delightful two-tone pink with the flowers crowded so tightly on the plant that the foliage is all but invisible. It's the latest in a series which also includes ‘Little Dancer' (flowers change from lilac to pink), ‘Little Dreamer' (orange pink), ‘Little Drifter' (coral pink), ‘Little Maiden' (pink/white bicolour) and ‘Little Tango' (orange).

In some sources, ‘Little Dazzler' is listed as white but the plants I admired at the show were very definitely an intriguing two-tone terracotta pink and ideal for containers and the frost of the border in full sun.

Clip the plants over if flowering starts to decline, soak them well - perhaps with a little liquid feed added - and they'll soon be flowering again strongly. The whole series is intended as summer seasonal plants but they may survive mild winters with good drainage .

‘Little Dazzler' was raised by Jimmy Jones who, with his wife Lyn, runs Penhow Nurseries in Wales.

You can order Diascia ‘Little Dazzler at the show, buy it in good garden centres but it's too late for mail order this season.

 

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All the attention on the Peter Beales Roses display has been on his new rose ‘Highgrove' and the Queen's visit to the exhibit on Monday. But he has two other new roses this year and both, perhaps unexpectedly, are Hybrid Teas.

With classic Hybrid Tea flowers on a more shrub like plant, ‘Grosvenor House' is rich gold with the flowers paling harmoniously to a much paler, primrose shade at the edges. ‘Grosvenor House' also has three other valuable features. It's neat in growth, just 90cmx90cm/3ftx3ft, so is deal in a small garden, towards the front of a large border, or in a container. It flowers right through the season, which makes it especially valuable in a tub or large pot. And don't forget its wonderful scent.

Like ‘Highgrove', ‘Grosvenor House' was bred by the late Colin Horner, past President of the Royal National Rose Society, whose roses have been on trial with Peter Beales at Attenborough in Norfolk for some years.

‘Grosvenor House' is named to celebrate the complete refurbishment of the Grosvenor House Hotel in its 80th anniversary year

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I wrote up the bright new bicoloured Pacific Coast Iris from Broadleigh Gardens, ‘Broadleigh Fenella', before the show. Then when I talked to Christine Skelmersdale, who runs Broadleigh, down at the show I found that she had two unexpected new introductions that she was showing at the Chelsea Flower Show for the first time.

The first was another of her long and seemingly ever improving series of Pacific Coast Irises that carry the Broadleigh prefix.

‘Broadleigh Eleanor' is a delicious, good-enough-to-eat mulberry purple with a sparkling yellow flash in the throat. The buds are a lovely deep shade while the foliage is also very dark. Earlier than most in the series, the flowers at the show had been held back and were the last of the season while ‘Broadleigh Fenella' was showing the first flowers of the season

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Every year Peter Seabrook of The Sun arranges for some new plants to be at the Chelsea Flower Show. Mostly, instead of rare and esoteric wonders of wild places or flights of the plant breeders imagination these are practical garden centre plants, often for patios and small gardens - plants you'll find in your local garden centre soon. He had a great collection this year on The Sun's quartet of gardens in the Great Pavilion entitled Gardens for All Ages.

Two new foxgloves stand out. I wrote up Digitalis ‘Pam's Split' before the show but there was also Digitalis ‘Candy  Mountain'. It's impressive, but frankly I'm not sure I like it. The vivid pink, boldly speckled flowers are huge and flared, they're closely packed all round the stem in very full spikes - and they face upwards! It's certainly dramatic, I'm just not it retains that natural foxglove elegance.

Also featured are a range of garden pinks including Dianthus ‘Passion' reaching just 25cm/10in with neat rounded flowers in rich velvety red - and of course there's the scent. Raised by Whetman Pinks, famed the world over for their new varieties, they say themselves that they think ‘Passion' is one of their very best introductions.

Finally we also got an advance look at a new runner bean. I've often grown ‘Painted Lady' for its pretty red and white bicoloured flowers but been disappointed in the crop. ‘St George' has the same appealing flowers but a crops far more heavily and tastes better

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Getting clematis ready for the Chelsea Flower Show can be tricky. The later flowering types in particular can be hard to encourage into flower in May and of course at the same time there's also the need to keep the early ones at their peak.

Thorncroft Clematis had earmarked a number of newcomers for Chelsea - some of them made it, some didn't and one of the newcomers they didn't plan to include surprised them by opening just in time.

I wrote about ‘Geoffrey Tolver' before the show and there it is looking especially sultry. The other new introductions on their impressive Gold Medal winning exhibit are 'Gojogawa' and ‘Temptation'.

'Gojogawa' is an unusual shape and an unusual colour. The slender pink petals have a pale central stripe matched well by its creamy cluster of stamens and are carried in two or three layers with the addition of a few slender creamy petal fragments in the centre. The effect is delightful. Raised in Japan by Hiroshi Takeuch, 'Gojogawa' is named after a river in Iwakura City, Japan. It flowers in May and June and again in August and September, reaching 1.8-2.4m/6-8ft.

‘Temptation' was the surprise performer for the show. Its sultry red petals surround a bold mass of smaller petals creating an anemone centre. This form is typical of early flowers in May and June, later blooms in August and September tend to be single. Raised in Holland by renowned clematis breeder Wim Snoeijer it reaches only 1-1.5m/3-4.5ft so is ideal for small gardens and containers.

You can order all three clematis at the show or order ‘Geoffrey Tolver', 'Gojogawa' and ‘Temptation' from the Thorncroft Clematis website.

 
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The Eagle Sweet Peas display is a little oasis of tradition and calm in the Great Pavilion of the Chelsea Flower Show, their lovely Silver-Gilt Medal winning display showing off old favourites as well as three bright new introductions.

I wrote about ‘Leominster Boy' before the Show, but they also had ‘Geoff Hughes' and ‘Keira Madeline' and both are exceptions to the normal run of sweet peas.

‘Geoff Hughes' is white with bright orange flecks and streaks. Excellent for shows and a fine garden variety, it's named for the actor Geoffrey Hughes, known for his roles in Heartbeat, Keeping up Appearances, The Royle Family and Coronation Street.

‘Kiera Madeline' is named for the six year old neice of Derek Heathcote who runs Eagle Sweet Peas. The colour is rich cream and each flower is bordered with a hazy zone of rose pink - the effect is delightful. ‘Kiera Madeline' is also blessed with a strong fragrance.

All three varietes were raised at the nursery by Derek, who started Eagle Sweet Peas after being made redundant from the motor industry nearly twenty years ago.

You can order seed of these varieties at the show or, in due course, from the Eagle Sweet Peas website.

 
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The Kelways peony tradition goes back a long way. Founded in 1851, Kelways have introduced more peonies than any other British nursery - by a long way - and perhaps more peonies than any nursery in the world. This year on the Silver Medal winning display at the Chelsea Flower Show they had a new tree peony, Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Shintenchi'.

David Root of Kelways explained that they have a friend who searches Japan for new tree peonies. "Many good plants are found in old gardens or nurseries," he explained, "and although some will have been named in the dim and distant past their names are long lost. The best are rescued and grafted on to new rootstocks so they can again be made available.'

‘Shintenchi' is a blowsy pink semi-double tree peony, pale rose pink in bud then becoming richer and with bold reddish flecks on the mature flowers. The flowers are set against attractive pale, slightly greyish foliage. And it's lightly scented - altogether a lovely plant.
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There are five ways of finding new plants at the Chelsea Flower Show apart, of course, from just looking at each and every exhibit.

* Some exhibitors make a point of sending out a press release in advance of the show announcing their new varieties. That's great.
* Some nurseries put out a press release once they arrive at the Show, and that's very helpful.
* I get tips from friends and colleagues and also from a few readers of this blog which is a great help.
* Of course, I also talk to the exhibitors, asking them what they have on show that's new.
* Then once or twice I just found myself walking past an exhibit and saying to myself: I haven't seen those before.

And that's how it was with the alliums, the ornamental onions, from W S Warmenhoven. I was walking by on my way to another exhibit and, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something a little different. In fact, quite a number of things that were a little different.

The one that really took my eye was ‘Purple Rain' which looked to be a hybrid between the familiar drumstick alliums we expect to see on the W S Warmenhoven stand and Allium christophii, the huge-flowered species that looks like an exploding firework. It had the same look as A. christophii, but with smaller, denser heads and with purple buds instead of the green buds of A. christophii. Really good.

Then I saw the 20cm/8in flower heads of ‘Atlas', crowded with pale steely purple flowers; pretty impressive. What was also striking about ‘Atlas' was the enormously stout stems, about 2.5cm/1in across at the base and only narrowing into the flower head which makes ‘Atlas' an especially robust cut flower. By contrast the stems of ‘Venus' are long and slender with purplish streaks and support the 10cm/4in heads of white eyed purple flowers.

There was also a new white, A. stipitatum ‘Mont Blanc' with slender green stems topped with very densely heads crowded with white flowers.

Al in all, four very impressive newcomers and you can order these alliums at the show or they will be available in due course on the W S Warmenhoven website.

 
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Did you see the piece about the Winchester Growers dahlia exhibit on BBC Two's nightly programme on the Chelsea Flower Show tonight? Not much about the display itself, just a few words with a deservedly thrilled John Wheatcroft who put it all together, some superficial discussion about eating dahlias and a bit of banter about the new dahlia named for presenter Joe Swift.

I bumped into Joe at the President's Lunch on Monday - this is the lunch for judges, members of the governing Council of the Royal Horticultural Society and other notables - and he told me how pleased he was to have a dahlia carry his name. "It's ultimate accolade, really, isn't it," he said, still slightly stunned. "Such an honour to have a plant named for you." But why did no one mention the lovely sweet pea ‘Alan Titchmarsh'? Anyway...

Dahlia ‘Joe Swift' is a gorgeous plant, with rich dark foliage setting off white flowers with a subtle network of veins and hint of pink as the flowers age. I was especially taken with the slight ripple to the petals which gives the plant real style.

‘Joe Swift' was bred by John Wheatcroft using ‘Magenta Star', which he mentioned in his BBC TV interview, as one of the parent plants and the spoecies D. sorensii as the other.

But from the very same batch of seedlings, from the same cross, from the same seed pod came ‘Perfect Partner', the second new dahlia on display. Again, dark foliage. But with white flowers boldly stained in magenta pink towards the tips.

The final newcomer on the display was hidden away in the greenhouse because the two plants had just a single flower on each - ‘Revive'. There are two stories attached to this variety.

First, it was raised by Keith Hammett, from New Zealand, one of the world's leading creators of new dahlia varieties and recipient of the 2009 Cory Cup, from the Royal Horticultural Society, for his work in plant breeding. You can see the vivid colouring of the plant - it really is spectacular.

Second, it's named for the potting compost, Revive, in which all the dahlias on the display were grown. And Revive is not only made from composted green waste, but also supports Britain in Bloom.

These three impressive dahlias contributed to this display from Winchester Growers, holders of the National Dahlia Collection, receiving the ultimate prize of the President's Award for the best display in the Great Pavilion. Pretty impressive for a first exhibit at Chelsea! Dahlias this good in May? Must deserve an award.

You will soon be able to order these new varieties from the National Dahlia Collection website from Winchester Growers.

 
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