Glory to the Tibouchina
Happy Public Holiday Monday!
Hope you all had a wonderful long weekend and are excited for the 4 day working week ahead! I must admit once upon a time my long weekends were filled with massive garden projects, but now that I work sweating it out all week my time off is much more low key. I did update all my pots with a coat of black paint though. Its the “changing the cushion colour” of the outdoor world. Did not get to shredding my massive pile of sticks for the compost…oh well!! They’ll keep.
xxKat.
If you’re in a subtropical or tropical area you’ll likely have seen a Tibouchina a.k.a. glory bush around. The more common form around here (T. ‘Alstonville’) has bright purple flowers on a 2m+ tree with big thick leaves and granted, they normally flower around Autumn, but some varieties, like my little Tibouchina ‘Elsa’ bloom all summer long.
Tibouchina come from tropical South America/Brazil and the genus name comes from the native name in the Guianas region.
Short segue from plants to learn some geography: The Guianas is an isolated region, north of Brazil, bordered by jungles in the south and the Atlantic Ocean in the north. The region primarily consists of the countries French Guiana, Suriname, and Guyana. Unlike most of South America, which speaks Spanish and Portuguese, the official languages in this region are French, Dutch and English. Several African and Asian dialects are also present. Wikipedia claims it’s one of the most isolated, sparsely populated and racially diverse regions in the world. Intriguing!
Back to the plants: Despite the abundance of bright purple Tibouchina flowers (and the fact that they are very hard to miss!) Tibouchina flowers also come in pinks and whites. While most foliage is a dark green with dominate veins, there are variegated leaf forms and of course the silver hue of Tibouchina ‘Elsa’ (which has comparatively smallish white flowers with purple stamens).
Whilst not deciduous, the leaves that do fall are often tough and hard to break down, which can be rather annoying. But once established they are a drought hardy plant that require relatively little maintenance. A good prune after flowering helps keep them compact.
The old fashioned Tibouchina ‘Alstonville’ and the pink flowered T. ‘Kathleen’ might be 5m+ trees but new cultivars are available in much more manageable <1m shrub sizes - so hit up your local nursery and see what takes your fancy.
