Sandpaper Vine. #13/100 x Flowers 2022
Petrea volubilis (Blue petrea, Purple wreath).
This species originally from Central and South America forms a robust scrambling vine with conspicuous lenticels on the stem. The leaves are simple, opposite and rough to the touch like sandpaper, hence another common name is sandpaper vine. Flowers are in pendulous racemes to 35 cm long. Each flower has 5 purple or lilac-coloured sepals, spreading out star-like, and these surround the purple corolla. The sepals are persistent fading to grey with age and eventually form the wings which assist in seed dispersal.
This very unusual plant, sometimes called purple wreath or sandpaper vine, is a delightful woody-stemmed, twining, evergreen creeper that is sometimes mistaken for a wisteria! It has its most spectacular display in early spring, but reblooms in late spring or early summer with another significant flush; further flushes may also occur later in summer! It has pendulous trusses of simple violet flowers held within cross-shaped lilac calyces, which persist long after the flowers have fallen, prolonging the show. It has curious sandpapery, evergreen foliage (hence one of its popular common names!) and grows well on a pergola, against a pillar or across the edge of a verandah roof."
Sandpaper Vine. #13/100 x Flowers 2022
Petrea volubilis (Blue petrea, Purple wreath).
This species originally from Central and South America forms a robust scrambling vine with conspicuous lenticels on the stem. The leaves are simple, opposite and rough to the touch like sandpaper, hence another common name is sandpaper vine. Flowers are in pendulous racemes to 35 cm long. Each flower has 5 purple or lilac-coloured sepals, spreading out star-like, and these surround the purple corolla. The sepals are persistent fading to grey with age and eventually form the wings which assist in seed dispersal.
This very unusual plant, sometimes called purple wreath or sandpaper vine, is a delightful woody-stemmed, twining, evergreen creeper that is sometimes mistaken for a wisteria! It has its most spectacular display in early spring, but reblooms in late spring or early summer with another significant flush; further flushes may also occur later in summer! It has pendulous trusses of simple violet flowers held within cross-shaped lilac calyces, which persist long after the flowers have fallen, prolonging the show. It has curious sandpapery, evergreen foliage (hence one of its popular common names!) and grows well on a pergola, against a pillar or across the edge of a verandah roof."