Fuchsia Tom West

The Fuchsia 'Tom West' is distinguished by its extraordinary variegated foliage. Its leaves combine green and cream, marbled with pale and vivid pink, offering a beautiful backdrop to delicate, bright pink bell-like flowers. A very successful combination of colors, which creates a magnificent spectacle from late spring to autumn. It is also a relatively hardy and easy to grow variety, magnificent in the garden or in flower pots.

Hybrid Fuchsias are numerous, and most of them are derived from Fuchsia magellanica and Fuchsia fulgens, sometimes with the contribution of Fuchsia triphylla, which adds length to the flowers, which are then characterized by thin tubes and violet-backed leaves. All these herbaceous to woody plants, more or less hardy and can be upright or trailing, belong to the onagraceae family, and are native to South America, the Caribbean and Australia.

The Fuchsia 'Tom West' is an old French cultivar, dating back to 1853, with remarkable foliage. It quickly forms a generous, bushy and upright shrub, about 60 cm (23.6 in) high and wide. The stems, initially herbaceous, become woody as the season progresses. They bear abundant foliage composed of narrow, deciduous leaves, opposite, whorled in groups of 3 or 5,  and are entire, 5 to 8 cm (2 to 3.1 in) long and lanceolate in shape. Each leaf is differently colored, but each has a combination of dark green, pink and red hues, randomly marginated with white-cream to pale yellow. The very prominent veins are also red. Its flowering extends from June to September-October. Its flowers are single, small, bright pink, composed of a long tube extended by 4 long and recurved sepals, and a corolla of wider and shorter violet petals. Long pink stamens complete the harmony of colors.

Usually grown as an annual, this Fuchsia is a perennial shrub that can be grown indoors, but also in the ground where frost is not too severe. Its hardiness ranges from -5°C (23°F) (without protection) to -10°C (14°F) when the plant is sheltered in winter. Fuchsias go well with hydrangeas and the foliage of ferns, rodgersias, orange heucheras or light green hostas. In a flower pot, for example, they can be accompanied by ivy, Silver Falls dichondra, lobelias or bacopas with very delicate flowers. Large double-flowered varieties will be well highlighted by upright varieties such as 'Price Noir' or 'Winston Churchill'.

Discovered in Santo Domingo in the 17th century and acclimatized in Europe, it was named Fuchsia (not Fuschia) in honor of a German botanist named Fuchs. Native to South America, botanical Fuchsias have gradually been multiplied. There are now tens of thousands of hybrids!

Green plants measuring 4 to 8 cm (1.6 to 3.1 in) in cases of 5 small plugs, 2.8 cm (1.1 in) in diameter and 4 cm (1.6 in) high. Our plants are at least eight weeks old and strong enough to be planted in the ground.