Dianthus allwoodii Romeo

Dianthus 'Romeo' is a carnation that combines hardiness, frugality, and originality. It forms a thick cushion of evergreen grey-green leaves and offers a long summer flowering period, which often starts in May and ends in September. Its fringed corollas, with an unusual colour, display a brown and white centre surrounded by dark pink. This variety is wonderful in rock gardens, punctuating them with attractive cushions all year round. A very hardy perennial that prefers well-drained soil and full sun.

'Romeo' belongs to the Caryophyllaceae family. It is a cultivar resulting from cross-breeding between Dianthus plumarius and D. alpinus. D. plumarius is a European perennial that is the main ancestor of the different groups of both old-fashioned and modern pinks and carnations. D. caryophyllus is Mediterranean. The plants in the allwoodii group are compact, vigorous, and very floriferous. The growth of this carnation is quite fast. Its adult size will not exceed 40cm (16in) in height when flowering, with a spread of 30 to 40cm (12 to 16in). It forms a dense clump from which astonishing bouquets of flowers emerge from May to July, and again in September. They are marked with brown-purple and white in the centre, with five fringed petals. The usually single flowers appear at the top of short stems. Its linear, glabrous, evergreen and leathery leaves are a superb grey-green.

'Romeo' is ideal for borders, embankments, and dry rockeries. It can accompany other flowering cushions such as helianthemums, silenes, dwarf artemisia (Artemisia lanata), wall bellflower, Caucasian rockcress, Phlox subulata, and Delosperma cooperi, or Erigeron karvinskianus, and bloody cranesbill (Geranium sanguineum). This plant looks lovely between the stones of a wall or paving, or in a planter. It adapts very well to pot culture, in light soil.