Plant Profile: Profusion Beautyberry

When answering questions or giving advice about choosing plants for a landscape or when working on a design for a new landscape installation, I always talk to people about the need to have year-round garden interest. We are all certainly reminded of the need for such as the stunning fall colors fade and leaves dancingly float to the ground while the relative barrenness of winter seems to quickly approach.

Winter landscape interest can be accomplished in a myriad of ways including: winter berries, stem and bark color, plant texture, winter flowers, interesting branching habits, and architecture. Today I wish to highlight a plant that displays arguably one of the most breathtaking berry clusters imaginable.

In fall and through early winter Profusion Beautyberry boasts a prolific display of  hundreds or thousands of small violet, purple berries that resemble some sort of magical pearl.  It is one of those plants whose berry display simply cannot be comprehended without experiencing it in person. I highly recommend giving serious consideration to beautyberry as part of your garden's fall and winter interest display.

Profusion Beautyberry ( Callicarpa bodinieri 'Profusion')

Profusion Beautyberry. Skyler Westergard Residence, WA. Fall 2013

Growing 6-10' tall and wide this plant likes good loamy, moist soil especially when flowering and during fruit set.  For a better fall and winter display the plant needs a fair amount of sunlight and can be planted in full sun or part shade and loves long hot summers.

Beautyberry gets its violet berries on the current seasons new growth so pruning about a third of the plant down to the base every year will promote its profusion of berry pearls.  On that note, if the plant gets too large and unruly the whole thing can be cut back to the base in late winter to reset its size.

In the summer the berries are preceded by loads of small pale pink flowers. Every flower will produce one berry so the quantity of midsummer flower display can be appealing as well.

The berries themselves are not poisonous, but are quite bitter as supposedly are the leaves. For this reason the shrub is listed as deer resistant. The berries can also attract birds. The American Beautyberry (Callicarpa americana), a close relative, is better suited for making jellies, for which recipes are easily available online, and is know also as the French Mulberry.

In the landscape, use Beautyberry as a woodland planting, massed together for more berry display, or combine with other fall and winter berry plants such as Red Winterberry, Cotoneaster, or orange Firethorn.

Plant Profile: PGM Rhododendron

PGM Rhododendren, Seattle, WA LDS Temple

The PGM Rhododendron is an early flowering, compact, broadleaf evergreen shrub.  I love this plant for its loud profusion of lavender flowers and fragrant scent. To me it smells like some sort of a bubble gum from my childhood.

It likes slightly acidic, organically rich soil which is moist, but not too wet and does well in the shade. 

The PGM is one of the earliest flowering not only Rhody's but spring shrub. It explodes with brilliance in April and, in the Puget Sound, vigorously beckons in spring earlier than spring wants to be beckoned.

Design uses could be as a broadleaf evergreen screen for year round green or as a spring focal point. I recommend planting the PGM in close enough proximity to patios and walkways where the flowers and fragrance can be enjoyed up close and personal. This little guy can certainly stand alone, but if so repeat it in several other places throughout the yard for balance and repetition. In the right area it could also be used as an informal, loose hedge as is done on the grounds of the Seattle LDS Temple in Bellevue, WA. There it is used to create a ring hedge around a circle of lawn resulting in a perfect outdoor room.