Courtesy of Hart Canna
Canna ‘Society Belle’
(Foliage Group)
Height Tall
Foliage Green
Form Spreading
Flower Orange
Blooming Good bloomer
Tillering Average
Awards RHS Award of Garden Merit, 2002
Canna ‘Society Belle’ is a tall Foliage Group cultivar; dark green foliage, elliptical shaped, spreading habit; oval main stems, coloured green; round flower stems, coloured green; spikes of flowers are erect, self-coloured orange, staminodes are long and narrow, edges irregular, partial self-cleaning, good bloomer, blooms open in the early morning; fertile both ways, not self-pollinating or true to type, capsules globose; rhizomes are thick, up to 7 cm in diameter, coloured pink and purple; tillering is average.
Photographs courtesy of
Hart Canna
RHS AGM Award 2002. An old variety with a new name and an interesting history. In 2002 RHS Wisley submitted a distinct but un-named cultivar to the canna trial. It was a variety widely grown and even naturalised in the wilder parts of the garden. It had no variety name so they simply called it C.
indica cultivar. Within the year of the trial, the 3 rhizomes that they planted grew into an enormous clump, and so impressed the judges that they awarded it the coveted AGM Award. This variety then retreated into obscurity, but continued to be grown as a naturalised plant in the RHS garden. Pan forward to 2013. We had acquired specimens of this plant from the RHS, and we felt that it deserved to be marketed commercially. So we approached the RHS and suggested that a plant with the AGM award should be given a variety name. The RHS duly gave it the variety name ‘Society Belle’.
It is a tall variety, around 2m, with green foliage lightly tinged bronze. It is very prolific, and is seemingly relatively hardy . It has small orange species-type flowers. It is distinct from ‘Musifolia Grande’ (ie it is not reminiscent of a banana plant), and distinct from ‘Purpurea’ (not so dark).
