Anisodontea Carnival Lights Celebration - Cape mallow

Anisodontea 'IB 710-1' Carnival Lights Celebration is a small ornamental shrub with a very long flowering period. Beautiful pink flowers, veined with fuchsia purple, bloom continuously from June to October. The numerous, upright stems, with medium to dark green leaves, show them off well. Perfectly adapted to hot, dry conditions, it finds a place in borders even in the smallest gardens as it doesn't exceed 1 m in height. Its compactness also allows it to be easily grown in a pot for overwintering under cover in climates where winter temperatures drop below -7°C.

Anisodontea is a member of the Malvaceae family, which includes over 240 very diverse genera, ranging from the small, countryside Mallows to the baobabs of Africa, including the highly prized ornamental Hibiscus. Nicknamed Cape Mallow due to its origin (South Africa), Anisodontea comprises 22 species of evergreen shrubs or small trees. Its name means "unequal teeth" in Greek, describing the morphology of its leaves with unequal lobes.
Belonging to the horticultural range "Carnival Lights", cultivar 'IB 710-1' Carnival Lights Celebration is appealing for its very long flowering, which stretches from June to October and even longer in a warm climate. The plant forms a compact, dense clump, 80 cm to 1 m in height, and 50 to 60 cm in width, and tolerates pruning well if necessary. Pruning will promote both compactness and flowering during the season. The plant branches easily, producing numerous thin, erect stems, clothed in trilobed, deep to dark green leaves. Their satiny surface and pleasant shape pair well with the single flowers that appear in late spring. Characteristic of Malvaceae, the flowers have a simple structure with five petals slightly overlapping, forming a broad, almost round corolla, reaching 4 to 5 cm in diameter. The dense pink petals are finely crossed by more intense veins tending towards fuchsia purple. A spot of the same shade at their base forms a darker heart, thus providing a subtle chromatic variation that enhances the romantic elegance of the whole. These bicoloured flowers, although solitary, are sufficiently numerous and harmoniously distributed on the plant for it to make a beautiful flowering pot. In many areas, it will need to be grown in a pot to be brought into a cool, bright room in winter due to its limited hardiness. In mild regions, it will work well in the ground, loving the sun and tolerating drought very well, although a few waterings in summer will support the flowering.

Anisodontea Celebration is a real gem for southern gardens, thanks to its South African origin, which allows it to withstand both heat and brief cold snaps down to -7/-8°C in well-drained soil and sheltered from the wind. In the south, you can plant it alongside other equally resilient plants like the charming Rockroses or Lavenders, allowing you to mix warm and cool coloured flowers. In warm regions, the superb, but not very hardy, Lantanas will further broaden the palette of possibilities to create a long-lasting floral border. In cold regions, treat your Cape Mallow as an orangery plant by associating it with small-growing citrus trees like the Kumquat or perennials such as Euryops, all of which you can grow in containers to overwinter them sheltered from severe frosts.