You can call it bronze all you like, but basically, we’re talking brownplus or—old-school—puce. I love to experiment with unusual annuals and have long mail-ordered old-fashioned tall nicotiana from companies like Select Seeds, which offers a good selection of plants, not just seeds. I love the sylvestris, which can get to 5-6 feet and offers elegant fountains of white tubular flowers. ‘Bella’ also provides tall plants with clouds of mixed pastel star-shaped blooms. Those two have always done well for me, so when the botanical gardens sale offered nicotiana langsdorffii ‘Bronze Queen,’ (shown above) I went for it, probably without looking too closely.
‘Bella’
The plants are a bit spindly and the flowers don’t offer quite the profusion as their relatives. They’re also brown, pretty much, especially from any distance. Up close, you see the reddish/purplish tones (my picture is flattering). In the not-as-trashy-as-other Regency novels by Georgette Heyer I still read used to read, women’s gowns or men’s jackets in puce were always a mistake. It was a “trying” color.
Unfortunately, I have the langsdorffii in 4 separate garden spots, both in a couple containers and in the ground. A tall annual like this can work either way. It’s doing Ok so I’ll keep it and see what people say. Overall, dreary colors like brown or black, unless offset by a bright foliage color or otherwise contrasted don’t work that well for me. I hate my mondo grass, which, sadly, is doing so well. But where black as a certain cache, brown is generally the color of death in the garden. Let the mums have it.
I should have stuck to yellow.
Oh, I’ve always said ‘Brown is a color too!” And I do like the color of this nicotiana as well as the green backside. Pair with chartreuse and something soft like Spirea thunbergii ‘Ogon’ or Spirea ‘Limemound’ (no brown or orange in its new foliage and sometimes has a different name now). It can grow partly through the foliage – front of the border plant for sure. Or play on its red/ brown hues with a hydrangea like Lady in Red underplanted with fern Athyrium otophorum, Eared Lady Fern (burgundy stems and tough). The flowers of Lady in Red turn almost a puce color as they age!
At least it doesn’t smell like something the dog left?
Puce is so named because it is the colour of fleas. No wonder it’s a “trying” colour!
I agree, however I was once surprised at the Cretaceous-seeming chocolate beauty of a pawpaw flower. So maybe not all ‘puce’ is bad?
I have read all of, and own most of, Georgette Heyer’s books, which were recommended to me in 1981 by a dear punk rock boyfriend, who adored them.