Plant Description

Buddleja 'Spring Promise'

Buddleja Spring Promise

I embrace any plant that has perfumed flowers in winter that herald spring. This Buddleja (possibly a cultivar of Buddleja asiatica) has long airy wands of dainty white fragrant flowers (smelling rather like Freesia) in July and August on a tall shrub to around 3 m tall. I have planted mine towards the back of a deep border, so that its white flowers are displayed well against a backdrop of the delicate black pendulous foliage of Agonis flexuosa 'After Dark' but where it can disappear into the shrubbery during summer and autumn, when it looks rather dull. It does get quite leggy so it needs hard pruning after it finishes flowering - alternatively it could be trained as a standard or a very small tree on a single trunk, with the old top growth removed after flowering. Like all Buddleja, this one attracts bees and butterflies to the garden. It thrives best in a free-draining position in full sun but will tolerate a wide range of conditions, including dry soil (once established) and part shade. It grows fast and seems to attract no pests or diseases. It grows easily from cuttings taken in spring or autumn. It does not self-seed as some of the other Buddleja species may do.

Postscript: in the end, I removed my specimen as I just could not control its gangly ways. I miss its lovely perfume in late winter.

 

Buddleja 'Spring Promise'
Flowers July and August.
Plant Family: Scrophulariaceae

Promotions