Camellia sasanqua

Camellia sasanqua carries a dense, fine-textured evergreen frame and flowers through autumn into early winter, when very little else in the garden is doing anything. 'Gay' opens single white flowers across a dense, broad frame. Grown on as an advanced standard, it brings a clipped, formal presence with a full season of colour already built into it.

In the landscape

Sasanquas are the workhorse of the formal Australian garden: planted at 1.2–1.5 m centres they knit into a solid clipped hedge within a few seasons, and at 2.0–2.5 m each plant keeps its own outline as a row of standards down a drive or terrace. Advanced stock like this is also used singly in courtyards, espaliered flat against a warm wall, or set in large pots either side of an entry. They sit well with buxus, gardenia, Magnolia grandiflora 'Little Gem' and liriope underplanting.

Growing notes

Evergreen, and hardy across a wide band of the country, southern and highland Queensland, the whole of New South Wales, Victoria and cooler districts, though less reliable in the humid tropical lowlands. Give it a slightly acidic, free-draining soil improved with organic matter and keep the root zone mulched and cool. Camellia sasanqua takes full sun far better than the japonicas, but in hot inland gardens morning sun with afternoon shade produces the best flower. Growth is moderate; frost hardy once established. Left unpruned it reaches roughly 3–5 m tall by 2–3 m wide in the ground, and it responds cleanly to a hard prune straight after flowering.

This tree

• Height: 3.0 m
• Canopy width: 3.0 m
• Caliper: 200 mm
• Currently standing: 43 trees

Field-grown ex-ground at Ravensbourne Farm, root-pruned and basket-lifted, delivered and craned Australia-wide, price on application through the Shortlist.