Once New Year's Day has passed, gardeners start to get excited about new plants and ideas for the landscape and garden. One plant that The Garden Guy wants to put in your mind is Proven Winners' "Landscape Shrub of the Year": Limelight Prime hydrangea paniculata. This year’s Pantone "Color of the Year" is Cloud Dancer and as the name suggests, it’s a cumulus cloud white, which Limelight Prime may fit perfectly for the garden.

Limelight Prime is considered a new generation of the much loved and award-winning Limelight. The difference is that it blooms earlier, which is important for colder areas. Its branches are sturdier, and flowers are brighter. It is also a perfect size for the landscape reaching 4 to 6 feet in height and 4 to 5 feet wide.

In my area it seems most of the Hydrangea paniculata plants are grown as a hedge, maybe a cluster of 3 to 5 where they can be seen be all who pass by. But they are largely "panicles without partners." While The Garden Guy is largely joking, I want everyone to think about planting "panicle pals" or combinations for your Limelight Prime hydrangeas.

It seems to me that no matter what type of planting you are going to do, Limelight Prime simply makes every style of garden better. In the South we have a lot of gardeners who like to plant a cutting garden. Let me remind you that 19 years ago, Limelight (the granddaddy) was selected as the Cut Flower of the Year for 2007, This award was courtesy of the American Specialty Cut Flower Association. It stands to reason that if Limelight won the award then, then Limelight Prime would be its equal and deserve a prominent place in the garden.

Light Prime is recommended over a huge area geographically, zones 3-9. Despite this I could not wait to try it with tropicals when I got mine in 2021. I planted it with a Red Abyssinian banana and Portora elephant ears. You would have trouble convincing neighbors the Limelight Prime was not an exotic tropical.

Every year since then I have changed the bed just to see how the looks perform. Sunstar Red pentas is another flirt with tropical and of course the red star-shaped flowers were a perfect match for the large white panicles.

I crave pollinators, particularly butterflies and hummingbirds, so some of my favorite partners with Limelight Prime are Rockin Playin’ The’ Blues salvia and Meant to Bee Queen Nectarine and Royal Raspberry agastache.

Then I’ve been adding shrubs like Miss Molly butterfly bush on each end of the bed and more perennials like Augusta Lavender heliotrope, Serendipity ornamental allium and Luminary phlox varieties Prismatic Pink and Ultraviolet. I’ve squeezed in a blue ceramic glazed bird bath and usually work in some chartreuse colored ColorBlaze coleus like Lime Time or Mini Me Chartreuse.

Limelight Prime performs best in soils with good drainage. In other words, a bog is NOT your friend. The soil pH is not such a large factor unless you are on the extremes, extremely acidic or extremely alkaline. I’ve pruned hard and I’ve pruned tall, but generally like pruning by 30% to 50% and trying hard to not overthink it. Just remember that whatever type of bed you have, the Limelight Prime will make it more beautiful.

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(Norman Winter, horticulturist, garden speaker and author of “Tough-as-Nails Flowers for the South” and “Captivating Combinations: Color and Style in the Garden.” Follow him on Facebook @NormanWinterTheGardenGuy.)

(NOTE TO EDITORS: Norman Winter receives complimentary plants to review from the companies he covers.)

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