Lagerstroemia indica Summer Beauty Centennial - Crape Myrtle

The Lagerstroemia indica 'Centennial', is a variety of Indian Lilac from the Summer Beauty series, gathering sturdy and very flowering bushes. This small variety, dressed in dark green leaves that serve as a backdrop, from the beginning of July, to a profusion of foamy clusters of a very lovely brilliant mauve. Summer Lilacs are also appreciated for their smooth bark, richly coloured, ornamental all year round, as well as their beautiful autumn colours. These bushes love heat but appreciate a little coolness in summer to support their flowering. This one will make a sensation isolated in a small garden or in a lovely pot on the terrace.

The Lagerstroemia indica 'Centennial' is part of a series of hybrids carefully selected for their colours, their precocity, floribundus, their compactness, and their lesser sensitivity to powdery mildew. This hardy variety is still little known in the horticultural trade.

'Centennial' belongs to the Lythraceae family, just like the Lagerstroemia indica, from which it comes. The latter is native to China. This bush has a bushy and ramified habit from the base, with a rounded crown, a little spread out. Small in size, it will reach about 1.50 m (4 ft 11 in) in all directions at ripeness. Its growth is quite rapid. It chooses the beginning of July to start its flowering, which will continue until September. The large inflorescences, in ramified clusters, are composed of very numerous small flowers carried by thin pedicels. Each flower has five very undulate-edged petals, the texture of which is reminiscent of crepe. They are gathered in large, dense panicles at the ends of the year's branches.

In 'Centennial', the floral buds bloom widely into frank mauve flowers that pink slightly over the hours, creating a subtle gradient of colours on the scale of the bush. The foliage, leathery and deciduous, is born bronze in spring, then becomes frank green and shiny. It is composed of ovate leaves, which take on lovely orange or coppery hues in autumn, depending on the climate, before falling. Finally, and to end on a beautiful note, its bark is decorative smooth, beige striate with grey, brown-red, peeling off in coloured plates (cinnamon, faded red, old pink, cream).

Indian Lilacs traditionally make the glory of the gardens of the South-West. This plant pefers humid and warm climates. It is a small tree that, in its improved forms, deserves to be acclimatised to colder areas, so long as care is given to the choice of variety and its location. Its hardiness and vigour allow it, like the new varieties of the Summer Beauty series. An isolated location, near the house, will allow you to fully enjoy this plant's generosity. It will look good in a low bush bed or in a small mixed variety and colour flowering hedge, or emerging from a mound of perennials. In autumn, it accompanies the equally as colourful cotinus and deciduous euonymus. In a large pot on the terrace, it puts on a show as the summer flowerings slow down. 

NB: Karl Von Linnaeus named this tree to honour his friend Magnus Von Lagestroem (1696 – 1759), who had sent it to him from India for identification. Originally, this tree was used to decorate Chinese temples. We wish to point out that this tree produces fruits that have a narcotic action in case of ingestion.