How many times have you pined over a new variety you’ve seen in a catalog or nursery? Speaking for myself, I’ve been seduced by the newest varieties too many times and then disappointed by their performance. My most recent disappointment has been the new Echinacea hybrid, ‘Sunrise’. When I first saw ‘Sunrise’ echinacea I was spell-bound with its beautiful yellow color and intoxicating fragrance ...   >> read article

Living in the heart of Virginia wine country has many benefits. My favorite vineyard is literally just a skip from my office door. While I most often lean towards the reds, a crisp Chardonnay on a hot day is hard to beat. Crisp and refreshing certainly describes the Proven Winners introduction Chardonnay Pearls® deutzia. The white pearl buds appear above the clean, chartreuse foliage like grapes on the vine and are slightly fragrant when fully open ...   >> read article

Chinese fringe tree (Chionanthus retusus) is a small deciduous tree or large shrub native to China, Korea and Japan. Do not confuse fringe tree with Chinese fringe flower (Loropetalum chinense) or our own native fringe tree (Chionanthus virginicus) which grows very shrub-like, and is fragrant.   >> read article

Coleus are certainly not new. They have gone in and out of popularity since Victorian times. Now they’re back with exciting new and beautiful varieties that add some real dash to beds and containers. They can be as bright and gaudy as a Hawaiian shirt or as formal as a black tie. Since the foliage is always ‘in color’, you never have to worry about the flowers, which are actually rather ugly and should be pinched off ...   >> read article

In Andrea Wulf’s fascinating book Founding Gardeners, we discover that George Washington was not only “first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen,” but he was also the new nation’s first serious tree hugger. One of his all-time favorite trees was the majestic tulip poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera), a species native to the vast hardwood forests east of the Mississippi.   >> read article