Winter Flowering Honeysuckle (Lonicera Winter Beauty or Lonicera fragrantissima)

One of my favourite shrubs in the garden is the winter flowering honeysuckle because of its wonderful scent and delicate creamy-white flowers. I remember walking around the Royal Horticultural Society garden at Wisley in January and you could smell the sweet scent from around the corner before seeing the shrub. There are few shrubs with such a delightful fragrance as winter flowering honeysuckle.

 

Lonicera ‘Winter Beauty’, as the name suggests, flowers in the winter and early spring, often when there are no leaves on the plant. It will form a large shrub about 6-8ft tall (2-3m) if left untrimmed so is good at the back of a border or as a specimen shrub. It will grow in sun or shade in any soil that is not waterlogged. It can also be trained against a wall.

 

I planted a winter flowering honeysuckle in the ‘Spiritual Garden’ at Curry Mallet Primary School and it is in flower now. If you like it, we have plants available at Greenshutters Nurseries & Garden Centre.