WHAT: Belle Etoile mock orange is beloved for its sensational, spicy fragrance, which flows through the garden like an unseen wave in midsummer.
Its abundant flowers are single, creamy white with maroon blotches at their centers.
WHY PLANT IT: One of a group of hybrids developed by French plant hybridizer Pierre Lemoine in the late 1800s, this hybrid is noted for better fragrance, a longer flowering period and a more compact habit than other varieties.
Also known as philadelphus, mock orange is substantial shrub, requiring room to spread.
Use it in a mixed border, informal screen or anywhere else its fragrance will be appreciated in summer.
WHERE: Mock orange prefers fertile, well-drained soil in full sun. It will grow in part shade, but produces fewer flowers.
It grows faster and looks better with an annual application of all-purpose fertilizer and regular summer watering.
Once established, it is drought tolerant.
HOW: Remove old, twiggy growth after the shrub finishes flowering.
If it becomes leggy, it can be cut back to ground level.
Mock orange’s flowering branches can be cut for decoration, the lower leaves stripped off and stems pounded before they are placed in water.
This shrub combines well with other plants that have purple foliage or flowers at the same time. Consider Blackbird penstemon, Rosea persicaria amplexicaulis or one of the purple-leaf cultivars of Japanese barberry, such as Rose Glow or Royal Cloak.
It can also be used to support the vines of the many fine clematis varieties that blooms on new wood, such as Madame Julia Correvon.
SIZE: This variety of mock orange is a fast-growing, spreading, deciduous shrub. It grows to about 5 feet high and 6 feet wide in five years.
LEARN MORE: See www.greatplantpicks.org.
Source: Great Plant Picks
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