Family Iridaceae
Garden origin.
- Upright sword-shaped leaves appear in spring, flooring a dense clump.
- Flowering for many months in summer with stunning orange/red/yellow blooms.
- Easy to grow in full sun or part shade, less tolerant of hot dry conditions than other crocosmias.
One of our favourite crocosmias, lush and broadly sword-shaped herbaceous leaves emerge from slowly spreading fleshy roots, called corms in spring. The foliage emerges as stiffly upright stems from which the broad leaf blades fan out, making an impressive spiky looking display before the flowers emerge.
Stunning rich golden/orange petals with a deep burgundy ring of markings inside the slightly pendulous bell-shaped blooms. Borne profusely on tall spikes over a long period in summer, this is one of the most intensely coloured and exotic orange flowers, with many fiery buds borne on arching dusky purple stems, each one with purple bracts, opening in a long succession of wide flared elegant blooms.
Stunning in exotic and traditional English planting schemes where it prefers slightly cooler, damper conditions than other Crocosmias, providing late-season colour planted with taller early flowering shrubs such as Calycanthus x raulstonii ‘Hartage wine’, Sophora microphylla ‘Sun King’ or contrasting with other late flowering plants such as Agapanthus ‘Midnight Star’, or Verbena bonariensis.
Easy to grow in any fairly damp soil type in full sun or light shade.
Height and spread after 1-2 years 60cm x 50cm
Mature height and spread after 4 – 5 years 80cm x 1m
