Echinacea Summer Cocktail - Purple Coneflower

Echinacea Summer Cocktail is a distinctive and charming variety. It offers a splendid range of colours in the garden, evoking the tones of a sunset. The buds open into a fresh orange-yellow. From the centre of the flower, the colour gradually changes to salmon pink then purple-pink, creating a beautiful gradient on a single flower, and on all the flowers that gradually bloom, in a lovely three-tone melody. Its elongated petals are slightly drooping, around a rounded orange-brown cone. It has all the classic characteristics of Echinaceas: a medium-sized plant with long-lasting flowers and good hardiness.

Echinacea Summer Cocktail belongs to the Asteraceae family. It is a horticultural creation resulting from Rudbeckia purpurea, among others, originating from the western United States, from Georgia to Michigan through Oklahoma and Ohio. This perennial, with a strong character, colonizes rocky meadows, savannas, clear undergrowth, and roadside edges in its natural environment. Summer Cocktail has a solid, bushy, upright, dense habit, reaching approximately 70 cm (28in) high and 45 cm (18in) wide. The opposite, lanceolate, green leaves are covered in rough hairs. Flowering from July to September, it is slightly fragrant and loved by butterflies. The branched stems are each topped with a solitary flower head, 15 cm (6in) in diameter, a prominent, rough, brown cone surrounded by slightly drooping petals whose colour evolves from orange-yellow to purple-pink through salmon pink as the flower matures. The fruit is an achene that releases seeds that birds love. This plant anchors itself firmly and deeply in the soil, thanks to its well-developed root system.

Nectar-rich Echinacea Summer Cocktail thrives in fertile, deep, loose, moist, and well-drained soil in a sunny position. Mulch the base in May to retain moisture during summer, as it is sensitive to drought. It brings dynamism and cheerfulness to flowerbeds with its remarkably colourful flowering. When plants are so generous in colours, it is fun to combine them with blooms of similar colours, but different shapes. Consider upright Foxgloves, Yarrows with flat corymbs, Star Daylilies, and Dahlias, which provide a variety of forms and colours. Ornamental grasses like Stipa tenuifolia, Schizachyrium scoparium, or Muhlenbergia capillaris with pink spikes bring structure, cohesion and softness to the ensemble. Its vibrant combination with Common Lady's Mantle is superb! Lastly, the beautiful colours of this Echinacea brighten up fresh or dried flower bouquets.