Caryopteris clandonensis Camara Dark Blue - Bluebeard

Caryopteris x clandonensis Camara® Dark Blue is a rather compact blue spirea selection with intense violet-blue flowering. From August to October, this small bush offers the gardener, as well as bees, numerous fluffy spikes. A late flowering, precious for adding colour and a source of food for pollinators at a time of year when they become rarer. Apart from its flowering, Caryopteris is appreciated for its aromatic foliage when crushed. It easily fits into borders, low hedges, and adapts to container gardening on a terrace. Not demanding, it is an excellent plant for well-drained soils, even limestone and fairly dry in summer.

Caryopteris x clandonensis Camara Dark Blue is one of the many hybrids obtained by crossing Caryopteris incana, an Asian bush known as 'Bluebeard', and Caryopteris mongolica, hardier, native to the colder regions of Mongolia and northern China. All belong to the Verbenaceae family. This cultivar 'Camara Dark Blue' forms a bushy shrub, with a bushy habit, about 1.20m (3ft 11in) high and 1m (3ft 4in) wide. It blooms in the second half of summer and until the beginning of autumn. Its inflorescences appear on the upper half of the current year's branches. They consist of countless tiny very dark blue-violet buds, gathered in large whorls or dense clusters, arranged in a staggered manner. The buds open into small intense violet-blue flowers, with prominent stamens. This flowering is particularly attractive to bees and nectar-feeding insects, and the bush is often visited by many colourful butterflies. The deciduous foliage, absent in winter, is a collection of thin and triangular leaves, 3 to 5cm (1.2 to 2in) long, aromatic, with irregularly toothed edges, arranged oppositely on straight stems. They have a dark green colour that appears more or less grey-silver depending on the dryness of the soil and the heat. When crushed, they release a resinous scent. 

Caryopteris Camara Dark Blue is planted in the company of equally frugal summer-flowering shrubs : Russian sages (Perovskia) and shrub sages, shrub cinquefoils, St. John's worts, catmints, dwarf buddleias, landscaping roses... In a more natural dry garden style, plant it with grasses and shrubs with silver foliage such as Stipas and wormwoods. A very romantic scene can be created in late summer by combining Caryopteris with shrubby mallows ('Barnsley', 'Princesse de Ligne', 'Blue Bird'), shrubby wormwoods, and asters. A group of 3 bushes surrounding a pastel reblooming rose is a splendor in September, as their very different flowerings complement each other perfectly. It can also be planted in a nice pot on the terrace or balcony, in a sheltered location.