Gardeners enjoying the wave of enthusiasm for the Royal baby can now buy the first plant named for the baby prince. This beautiful white clematis is named ‘Prince George’ and is not only prolific and long flowering but also one of those varieties which is especially easy to prune. And it will be in bloom every year on the prince’s birthday.
The flowers of ‘Prince George’ are large, pure white and very prettily ruffled along the edges of the petals and this is a variety in the same group as the old favourites ‘Jackmanii’ and ‘Perle d’Azur’(Group 3), flowering from July to the autumn. So every year it will be bursting with bloom around the time of the prince’s birthday. (The white clematis I featured last time flowers earlier.) It has the same tendency as ‘Jackmanii’ to carry flowers with either four, five or six petals and in some conditions may have a slight ice blue tint.
The most familiar comparable variety is ‘John Huxtable’ and, while ‘Prince George’ has slightly smaller flowers, they are more open in form and have prettily frilled edges. ‘Prince George’ arose as a sport of the pale blue ‘Blue Angel’, it was found at the wholesale nursery New Leaf Plants by Peter Hoddinott.
Editor-in-Chief of the RHS Encyclopedia of Perennials; writer for a wide range of newspapers and magazines including The Garden and The Plantsman; member of the RHS Herbaceous Plant Committee and Floral Trials Committee; author of many books on plants and gardens.
Source: RHS My Garden – Clematis ‘Prince George’: Named for the Royal Baby
