How to choose a shrubby Potentilla: buyer's guide

Find the ideal potentilla: colours for every taste

Potentilla bush shows great diversity of flower colours: pale or vivid, solid or graduated… Every gardener or flower enthusiast will surely find a Potentilla plant to suit them!

Shrubby potentillas in bright colours

• Varieties of potentillas with red flowers bring pep and energy to the garden: Potentilla fruticosa ‘Marian Red Robin’ offers a true red, while flowers of variety ‘Red Ace‘ tend towards an intense vermilion (the 1^st variety being an improvement of the 2^nd, bred for more abundant and more vivid flowering).

Red flowers of potentillas ‘Marian Red Robin’ © De Nolf and ‘Red Ace’

• For a slightly softer colour, the lovely ‘Mango Tango’ bears orange flowers tinged with red. As for the stunning ‘Bella Sol’ and ‘Hopley’s Orange’ varieties, they will brighten your beds with their vivid orange flowering.
• Want to bring sunshine into your garden? Choose potentillas with yellow flowers: Potentilla fruticosa ‘Goldfinger’ a bright yellow with a slight ochre tint, or ‘Goldteppich’ and ‘Kobold’ a bright golden yellow.
• Variety ‘Lemon Meringue’ has small double lemon-yellow flowers and the rarer ‘Citrus Tart’ has yellow flowers with a greenish tinge.

Potentilla ‘Kobold’ has a brighter yellow flowering than ‘Lemon Meringue’

• Finally, potentilla varieties with pink flowers are not left behind: ‘Bellissima’ with its unmistakable vivid pink, ‘Pink Paradise’, true to its name with abundant clear pink flowering, and ‘Lovely Pink’, whose small pale pink flowers recall wild roses.

Shrubby potentillas in pastel shades

For a romantic-style garden, adopt potentillas in softer hues.

• Recent variety ‘Double Punch Peach’ offers splendid double flowers in extraordinary colours: a gradient of pink, salmon and yellow, producing flowers that look like real watercolours!
• Potentilla fructicosa ‘Glamour Girl’ produces unusual bicoloured flowers in salmon-orange tones with petals edged in pink. A true poetic touch in garden!
• The lovely ‘Primrose Beauty’ with its soft pale yellow shades contrasts nicely with its silvery-green foliage.
• On the pink side, ‘Double Punch Pastel’ offers a rosy-white shaded with peach and salmon; ‘Princess Pink Queen’ and ‘Pink Beauty’ bear pale pink flowers with yellow centres.

Soft pastel colours of ‘Primrose Beauty’ and ‘Princess Pink Queen’

White potentillas

Want a potentilla with white flowers for an even cleaner look or to pair with brightly coloured plants?

• Choose the Potentilla fruticosa ‘Crème brulée’, ‘White Lady’ or variety ‘Abbotswood’, whose magnificent white flowers reveal a yellow centre.

Potentilla ‘Abbotswood’ and its immaculate white flower with yellow centre

• Flowers of variety ‘Limelight’ are more cream-toned, with a slightly paler yellow flower centre.

Can’t decide between all these colours? Choose our collection of 3 Potentilla fruticosa: a mix of pink and white colours perfect for a delicate touch in the garden!

Different colours of flowers of shrubby potentillas

Choosing potentilla by flower shape

Most shrubby potentillas have single flowers (single, solitary flower borne on a peduncle) in a 5-petalled cup shape, about 3 cm in diameter. But some varieties offer larger flowers for an even more impressive flowering.

Potentillas with larger flowers

The variety ‘Bellissima‘ treats us to 4 cm flowers in a vivid pink. As for ‘Bella Sol’ and ‘Goldfinger’, their flowers can reach up to 5 cm in diameter.

Potentillas with double flowers

Among double-flowered varieties of potentilla, bearing many petals, are the yellow flowers of ‘Citrus Tart’ and the magnificent ‘Double Punch Peach’ and ‘Double Punch Pastel’.

Splendid double flowers of potentilla ‘Double Punch Peach’ © Hortival Diffusion

Choose potentilla by flowering period

Flowering of shrubby potentillas generally takes place in summer, from June to September. Some earlier varieties begin flowering as early as May and still flower in October, before first frosts.

Top shrubby potentillas with the longest flowering period (nearly 6 months!) are three varieties:

• ‘Double Punch Pastel’
• ‘Hopley’s Orange’
• ‘Citrus Tart’

For early flowering from May, you can also plant Potentilla ‘Mango Tango’, ‘Lovely Pink’, ‘Kobold’, ‘Limelight’ (awarded in England for its garden performance!) and ‘Pink Beauty’.

Shubby Potentilla ‘Limelight’ flowers from May to September

For flowering that extends into October, also consider Potentilla ‘White Lady’.

Different pruning techniques for shrubby potentilla

Potentillas usually have a fairly irregular bushy habit, which is all part of their charm. Heights at ripeness vary from 40 cm up to 1.20 m, but average is around 80–90 cm tall with a 1 m spread.

Largest shrubby potentilla varieties

• For a wild, natural effect in the garden, turn to the largest potentillas, such as the variety ‘Goldfinger’ with its 1.20 m height and spread.
• For a more graphic look: Pink Beauty, Lovely Pink and White Lady have a more regular habit forming a pretty ball-shaped silhouette 90 cm all round.

Potentilla ‘Goldfinger’: a yellow-and-green shrub with a wild appearance

Smaller shrubby potentilla varieties

• Variety ‘Goldteppich’ is one of the smallest shrubby potentillas: its height at ripeness reaches only 40 cm with a 90 cm spread.
• Potentilla fructicosa ‘Red Ace’ (55 cm tall and 90 cm spread) and ‘Double Punch Pastel’ (50 cm tall by 1 m wide) will also fit easily into your garden.

More compact silhouettes

For a more compact touch, choose small varieties with equal size in every direction: this is the case for potentillas ‘Bella Sol’, variety ‘Glamour Girl’ or ‘Bellissima’ (60 cm in height and spread).

Different uses of Potentilla

Shrubby potentillas are versatile and adapt to many uses: borders, edging, informal hedges, as specimens… They suit all garden styles, whether natural, romantic or structured.

Close-up on varieties best suited to specific uses :

Groundcover shrubby potentillas

• Potentilla variety ‘Goldteppich’ can be planted in various situations (beds, borders, large pots), but its spreading growth makes it an ideal groundcover in rockeries, on a low wall or at an edge.
• Likewise, varieties ‘Red Hace’ and ‘Marian Red Robin’, small, spreading bushes with a low habit and many very ramified basal branches, adapt very well for use as groundcover.

Potentillas for banks and rockeries

Recent variety ‘Bellissima’ has a naturally compact silhouette, which does not require pruning. It can be planted on a bank or in a rockery, as can varieties ‘White Lady’ or ‘Double Punch Pastel‘.

Potentillas suitable for container growing

• Variety ‘Goldfinger’, with its abundant foliage, will find its place perfectly in a large container on a terrace and will brighten it up.
• The bushy, regular and rounded habit of shrub Potentilla fruticosa ‘Lovely Pink’ will also suit container culture.

‘Lovely Pink’ will make a striking display in a pot

• The compact, dense silhouette of ‘Bella Sol’, whose abundant dark green foliage contrasts beautifully with its pink flowers, will enhance your terrace or balcony.
• Finally, slightly larger in size, varieties ‘Kobold’ or ‘Limelight’ will also adapt very well to container growing.

Select a potentilla according to your planting constraints (soil, exposure and climate)

Potentillas are undemanding bushes and very tolerant: they grow in most soils (clay-limestone, clay-silty), provided they are drained (do not retain too much water).

They develop in full sun (avoiding, if possible, scorching summer spots) or in partial shade and are well suited to our climates in France.

Potentillas suited to heavy soils

• Variety ‘Hopley’s Orange’ will adapt to clay soil if planted on a bank or in a rockery.
• Potentille fruticosa ‘Pink Paradise’ and its great adaptability will tolerate heavy soils (without being waterlogged), even rich ones.

‘Pink Paradise’ likes drained soils, but will also acclimatise to heavy, rich soil

Potentillas to plant in poor soil

• Variety ‘Mango Tango’ will be equally happy in meadow or rockery.
• Cultivar ‘Goldteppich’ will feel at home in any drained soil, even calcareous and fairly dry in summer.

Bushy potentilla ‘Mango Tango’ likes rocky soils

• Finally, poor calcareous soils (alkaline, well-drained), sandy or even stony, will be perfect for ‘Red Ace’ or variety ‘Kobold’.

Potentillas for very sunny exposure

In very sunny regions or situations, prefer Potentilla with pale flowers, whose colours will be enhanced by sunlight: ‘Abbotswood’, ‘Lemon Meringue’, ‘Primrose Beauty’.

Potentillas for shadier exposure

To avoid risking loss of the attractive colours of red, orange and pink-flowered varieties, prefer planting in semi-shaded situations, to prevent sun bleaching. Bright red flowers of ‘Marian Red Robin’, for example, will become more orange, then yellow, if grown in full sun.

Hardiness of bushy potentillas

Potentillas have very good hardiness: they withstand temperatures down to -15°C, but some varieties tolerate even lower temperatures.

This is the case, for example, for varieties of Potentilla ‘Mango Tango’, ‘Double Punch Pastel’, ‘Lemon Meringue’, ‘Red Ace’, ‘White Lady’ or ‘Kobold’, tolerating down to -20 / -25°C.

Potentille ‘Double Punch Pastel’: variety as beautiful as it is hardy! ©Pépinières Minier

The cold champions are ‘Lemon Meringue’, which comes from Canada, and potentille ‘Crème Brulée’, which tolerate temperatures down to -30°C!

Our favourite shrubby potentilla varieties

If despite this information you still cannot choose the ideal shrubby cinquefoil, here are our top 3 favourite varieties!

• ‘Double Punch Peach’ for its incredible double flowers;
• ‘Hopley’s Orange’ for its long flowering;
• ‘Bellissima’ for its bright colour, which will brighten garden or balcony with no effort.

Our favourites: potentillas ‘Double Punch Peach’ © Hortival Diffusion, ‘Hopley’s Orange’ and ‘Bellissima’ © Pépinières Sapho