2019 Proven Winners at The Garden Show in Philadelphia

suggested thumbnail image: Gomphrenia 'Truffula Pink'


The Proven Winners display is always one of my favorite Flower Show stops. PW plants aren't just pretty faces dressed in new colors. Toughness and disease resistance are key to selecting new introductions. I take a good look when I see the Proven Winners pots at local nurseries.

I've grown dozens of varieties of basil, my favorite herb. This year's Proven Winner's selection knocked my socks off with a one-two punch of sterile blooms and an unheard-of resistance to downy mildew.
'Amazel' Basil produces tasty harvests until frost. Usually, a flowering stalk of basil develops a nasty, bitter flavor as the plant gets into seed production mode. 'Amazel' does bloom late in the season, but with no seed production, it doesn't start winding down after that. I've been waiting for a basil that doesn't go to seed!
In fact, you can bring 'Amazel' plants into the house over winter and continue pinching it back for salads, pastas, and soups. The flip side is that since this basil is propagated only from cuttings, it won't be cheap. Compared to the cost of fresh basil in the grocery store, though, it'll be a bargain if you keep it going inside.

But how does it really taste?? I was invited to pinch off a little tip to sample. I'm delighted to report that this is neither bland nor harsh. It has a strong but sweet flavor, with a slight anise note. I'd compare it favorably to the best Italian varieties and try it in pesto. There's some cinnamon basil in its genetic makeup, so you may taste a little spice in it.
The cinnamon basil genes are also thought to be key to another first -- the remarkable resistance of 'Amazel' to downy mildew. In testing, dozens of varieties were given a heavy inoculation of downy mildew, just sprayed everywhere. Everything within the testing area turned grey, except for one bright green patch. 'Amazel' was entirely unaffected. That's amazing.



The brilliant magenta pink of 'Rockin Fuchsia' Salvia, S. longispicata x S. farinacea, is a breeding breakthrough, nothing like the light pink or lilac pink of some S. farinacea varieties. Like its sisters, 'Rockin Playin the Blues' and 'Rockin Purple', this sterile interspecific hybrid pumps out its large blooms until a hard frost.

'Rockin Fuchsia' has magenta blooms on mahogany-to-black shaded calyxes, further set off by dark foliage. Even with just a couple of blooms on the exhibited plant, I could see its eye-popping potential. These are tough plants, drought-resistant once they get a good root system. They don't need deadheading but do respond to a good trim with dense new growth.

'Rockin Fuchsia' draws pollinators and hummingbirds with its extra-sweet nectar. In test gardens, bumblebees and hummingbirds swarmed the plants and were even seen to battle over the blooms! It's hard to find nectar plants for those final weeks before frost, as if you need any more reasons to consider this "winner."


Another Salvia introduction is notable for its unique foliage color. 'Rockin Golden Delicious' pineapple sage has lovely lemony gold foliage. Both leaves and blooms of Salvia elegans are a nice addition to fruit salad or iced tea and a treat for your nose when you brush against the plant. If you've grown regular pineapple sage, you can imagine those bright red blooms against these equally bright leaves -- a late-summer fiesta!
Will these new sages overwinter outside? In zone 7, excellent drainage and a good covering of mulch should help overwinter the "Rockin" hybrids, but pineapple sage is marginally hardy in zone 8. In my zone 6, I've had mixed success in overwintering other tender salvias by bringing indoors and watering sparingly. I'll try again with these must-have beauties.


Euphorbia 'Diamond Mountain' forms a compact mound with a profusion of tiny white blooms, no pinching required. It would be a sparkling addition to a colorful border or a perfect specimen in a minimalist green-and-white display of plants in black pots. Although described as an annual, it's another tender perennial that could be overwintered in a sunny window.


'Truffula Pink' Gomphrenia charmed me with its name (I'm a huge Dr. Seuss fan) and won my heart with its floriferous display. The stems and bright magenta blooms seemed more closely-spaced than with seed-grown Gomphrenia strains. Many of the blooms were double or triple, rather than being small single globes. I don't think I've seen that before, and I wonder if it's a side effect of sterility. I'm not troubled by unwanted Gomphrenia seedlings, so I wouldn't choose this variety for its lack of seeds, but I'd sure choose it for its blooms. I do always have volunteers of Rose Campion, Lychnis coronaria, whose airy magenta blooms would make a great color-echo companion.


New for this year were Supertunia 'Blue Skies' and Supertunia 'White Charm', both on display and looking gorgeous. The smaller flower size of Supertunias makes them more suited as container fillers and spillers than as bedding plants. They're self-cleaning, but an occasional trim will increase branching, and by late summer they'll need a good pruning to look their best again. All this flower production does mean you'll need to feed the plants regularly to keep them performing well. The Proven Winners site gives guidelines for fertilizing and trimming. That's more fussing than most Proven Winner plants need, but the effort will pay off in a showstopping floral display.


Double Calibrachoas have apparently been around for several years, but somehow I've missed them -- and they're so pretty! I fell for the subtle beauty of the Superbells 'Double Chiffon'. The flowers reminded me of delicate creamy-yellow sweetheart roses. Its companion, Superbells 'Doublette Love Swept' has pink blooms with white picotee edging. Two earlier introductions, 'Double Ruby' and 'Double Orchid ', have my attention as well.


A go-with-anything filler and spiller for containers, Angelonia 'Angelface Cascade White' is another blooming machine. When I see "self-cleaning" in a description, I read it as "sterile," as seed-forming blooms would hang on after petals die back. The cheerful yellow blooms of Calendula 'Lady Goldiva Yellow' are mostly double -- and, again, mostly sterile. Much as I love to save seeds, "sterile" is also fine with me, as it means the plant is putting its energy into a longer show of growing and blooming.

Compact size is increasingly seen in new plant introductions. Some Proven Winner shrub selections are sized for the front of the perennial border rather than for the "bones" of a larger garden, and they'd be at home in containers as well.

'Sonic Bloom Pink' Weigelia was on display, a tiny dark-leafed gem of a shrub that I was assured would smother itself in blooms this spring, a long-lasting display just like the tag photo. Proven Winners has given us some surprisingly compact butterfly bushes, such as the "Lo and Behold" series. This year's Buddlea 'Pugster Amethyst' wasn't on display in Philly, but their website description promises "full sized flowers on a dwarf plant." No worries about spreading with newer varieties; most are sterile and non-invasive. The newest dwarf Crepe Myrtle in the "Infinitini" series is described as "the brightest purple yet." It may freeze to the ground at the top of its zone 6-9 range, but should sprout right back up from its roots. That's great news, as few of the colorful crepe myrtles seem truly winter hardy for me in zone 6.


Proven Winners "Annual of the Year" is 'Lemon Coral' Sedum mexicanum, a short, dense, spreader with narrow, chartreuse leaves, PW says the dense foliage will "layer and stack" like Farrah's hairdo from the 70's as it spills over container edges. I can see it jumping off nursery shelves for its bright foliage and tidy habit, but it's tender above zone 7. With hardy varieties handy in my garden, including the similar 'Angelina' and an unknown chartreuse ground cover that grows anywhere I drop it, this is one I can skip. Still, the claim that the bright color and soft, dense foliage will be top notch all season may have me taking another look, especially if I find it on the sale shelves.


A lime-green container plant that's far more likely to come home with me is Ipomoea 'Sweet Caroline Kiwi'. I've never seen such a branching, compact habit in an ornamental sweet potato, and I was told this specimen hadn't been pinched back for fullness – that's just the way she rolls. Sweet!



Need more foliage color? New coleus this year include 'ColorBlaze Golden Dreams', ColorBlaze 'Sedona Sunset', and 'ColorBlaze Torchlight'. With coleus, the interest is in the leaves and not the flowers. Varieties are selected to bloom as late in the season as possible, possibly not at all before frost cuts them down.

For perennial foliage, Heuchera colors intensify again this year with the glowing 'Cherry Truffle' and the bronzed 'Peachberry Ice '. I liked the bright contrast in the blue-green and sunny yellow leaves of Hosta of the Year 'Shadowland Autumn Frost '. The heavy corrugated substance of the leaves should make this variety less attractive to slugs. Of course, the breakthrough we're all waiting for is a hosta the deer won't like!


With the continuing trend toward gardening in containers and smaller spaces, I expect Proven Winners to continue bringing us excellent varieties of super-productive sterile plants in compact, no-maintenance sizes.

For more 2019 introductions, check the website below and look for the distinctive PW pots and tags at your local nursery.
Proven Winners


Many thanks to the friendly folks at the 2019 Proven Winners exhibit!

Images in this article belong to the author; please do not copy without permission.