Lagerstroemia indica With Love Kiss - Crape Myrtle

The Lagerstroemia indica 'Kiss' ('Milarosso) is a beautiful dark pink variety of the 'With Love' series, which brings together truly compact Indian lilacs with generous summer flowerings, well resistant to frost, perfect for ornamenting pots and small gardens. This one produces numerous foamy clusters in a gradient from dark pink to lighter pink. Summer Lilacs are also appreciated for their richly coloured bark, ornamental all year round, as well as their beautiful autumn colours. These bushes love heat, but appreciate a little freshness in summer to support their flowering. 

The Lagerstroemia indica 'Kiss', obtained in Italy, is part of a series of hybrids carefully selected for their compactness, their precocity, their floribundus and their hardiness. The Indian lilacs 'With Love' come in pale pink (Babe), mauve purple (Eternal), bright pink (Girl), pure white (Virgin) and dark pink (Kiss). 

The Indian Lilac 'With Love Kiss' Milarosso belongs to the Lythraceae family, just like the Lagerstroemia indica, from which it originates. Small in size, this plant will reach approximately 70 cm (27.6 in) in height and 40 cm (15.7 in) in width at ripeness. Its growth is rather slow. It chooses the month of July to start its flowering, which will continue until September. The large inflorescences, in ramified clusters, are composed of very numerous small flowers borne by thin pedicels. Each flower has five petals with a very undulate edge, the texture of which resembles that of crepe. They are gathered in large, dense panicles, at the end of the year's branches. This flowering attracts bees and butterflies.

In 'Kiss', the floral buds bloom widely into deep pink flowers that fade over the hours, creating a very cheerful gradient on the scale of the bush. The foliage emerges bronze in spring, then becomes vivid green and glossy. It is composed of ovate leaves, which take on orange or coppery hues in autumn, depending on the climate, before falling. Finally, its bark is beautifully decorative: smooth, beige striate with grey, brown-red, peeling off in coloured plates (cinnamon, faded red, old pink, cream).

The Indian Lilacs prefer humidity and heat. If appropriate care is given, this bush also deserves to be acclimated in colder areas and Kiss With Love is a good option. You can plant it alone, but it will also be valuable in a shrub massif, a flowering hedge, or emerging from a mound of perennials. Its long summer flowering can be complemented by that of early and spring-flowering bushes. The Japanese Quince Red Joy will thus produce superb bright red flowers from March, before the appearance of leaves, which will evolve in autumn into decorative yellow fruits. The classic but indispensable Philadelphus coronarius will take over with its pure white flowers in May-June, with an absolutely irresistible scent. To extend the season beyond the flowering of our Lagertroemia 'Kiss With Love', give it the neighbourhood of a bush with decorative fruits, like a Snowberry or a Callicarpa. Even better, the Leycesteria formosa Golden Lanterns, a Pheasant Tree too little known despite its many qualities, which include its decorative fruits until November, provides a white and red flowering at the same time as that of 'Kiss With Love', as well as a golden foliage that will create a happy contrast all season!

NB: Karl Von Linnaeus named this tree to pay tribute to 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 would like to point out that this tree produces fruits that have a narcotic action if ingested.