Well, it’s official: 2025 is here. We just closed the chapter on one year and now we begin to fill out the first few pages of the next. The holiday season has ended, but trade show season has just begun. And that means it’s time for one of my favorite discussion topics: new plants.

When it comes to new perennials for 2025, we’re especially excited about the launch of our native plants program. We’ll be adding over 40 species of perennials into production this year that are native to Illinois and Wisconsin, including Coreopsis, Echinacea, Liatris, Lobelia, Rudbeckia, several species of Carex, and many others. We based our selections on customer feedback and recommendations, and we plan to develop this program much further over the next few years. As someone who has lived in Wisconsin for most of my life, with much of that time spent exploring the outdoors, I’m looking forward to growing so many of the perennials native to the woods, prairies, and meadows of the Midwest. We’ll be sending out more information about specific varieties in the coming weeks, but a few of my personal favorites include Baptisia alba (White Wild Indigo), Eryngium yuccifolium (Rattlesnake Master), Ratibida pinnata (Yellow Coneflower), Silphium laciniatum (Compass Plant), and Lobelia cardinalis (Cardinal Flower).

New for 2025 is Hibiscus ‘Cookies and Cream’, and I think this variety is going to be a hit. We typically have at least one new perennial Hibiscus on our roster each season, but I’ll be the first to admit that it can be difficult at times to pinpoint exactly what is truly new about some of these varieties. That’s not the case with ‘Cookies and Cream’ because of the unique combination of matte black foliage and pure white flowers. Like many of the more recent Hibiscus introductions, this variety is very compact (some might even say cute), reaching only 3’ tall and 4’ wide.

Hibiscus Summerific® 'Cookies and Cream' PPAF

We’re also adding another member of the Firefly Collection of yarrow to our perennial lineup this year: Achillea ‘Firefly Red Pop’. This was a standout variety that we trialed in 2024, with an exceptionally sturdy and compact form, excellent flower color, and high bud count. Just as Achillea ‘Firefly Sunshine’ is a great alternative to ‘Moonshine’, we think that ‘Firefly Red Pop’ is an improved ‘Strawberry Seduction’, with just as much flower power but a more consistent habit.

More favorites from our 2024 trials are Penstemon barbatus ‘Pink Pearls’ and ‘Rose Rhinestones’. Part of the Bejeweled™ Series, these varieties are absolutely stunning. With bright pink flowers that nearly cover the entire stem, and a neat, clean habit with glossy foliage, these Penstemon should fly off the retail shelves. They’re listed as hardy to Zone 4, but we’ll be monitoring them in our trial garden to see how well they perform in the landscape.

Penstemon barbatus Bejeweled™ 'Pink Pearls' PP36004

Penstemon barbatus Bejeweled™ 'Rose Rhinestones' PP36003

We’re always looking for a reliable lavender that doesn’t melt out in our hot, humid summers. On a tour of the Walters trial gardens in mid-July last year, Lavandula ‘Imperial Gem’ was one of only two lavender varieties on display that was still green and thriving (the other was Phenomenal®). So we knew we had to try it. But, perennials and shrubs that flourish in the sandy soils of Western Michigan don’t always hold up in our climate or in a production setting, so it’s essential that we trial them ourselves before we promote them to our customers.

Finally, Heuchera ‘Timeless Night’ is one of the best performing Heuchera varieties we’ve seen in years. The combination of jet black foliage with bright, long-blooming flowers has set a new standard for coral bells. So far, it’s held up well in the container through every season, and we’ll monitor its success in our trial garden.

Behind every exciting new perennial we add into production, there’s a dud that we need to drop. In 2025, we’ll be saying goodbye to some plants that just didn’t make the cut. Here are just a few:

Artemisia ‘Silver Lining’ looked good at first, with clean silver foliage. But after only a few days on the hotlist, the foliage took a quick turn for the worst, turning brown and unsightly. Cutting the plants back hard was only a temporary fix, and the brown spots soon returned. For now, the answer to the question: “Will customers pay more for a branded Artemisia?” is still no.

Colocasia ‘Polargreen’ was a fun introduction, but it offered little more than the novelty of being a hardy elephant ear and didn’t garner much interest from customers. So we will not be renewing it for a second season.

Panicum ‘Niagara Falls’ and Lavandula Sensational!® are two great examples of plants that we love to grow but struggle to sell. Both are vigorous growers and present well in the container and the landscape. But, after two seasons of low sales, we’ll be taking them out of production for now.

I think we can all agree that growing new plants is one of the fun parts of the job. It’s exciting to watch them grow and see how they compare to older varieties. But the most important part of this process is providing feedback to and getting feedback from our customers, and finding the right time to have those conversations is crucial. We all want to know what’s coming down the pipeline, but that’s only the beginning of the story. We need to understand what our customers are looking for in a new variety, because simply being new doesn’t cut it anymore. And our customers need to hear from us about how these plants perform - just because a plant looks great in the breeder’s trial garden doesn’t mean it does well in production. When it comes to new plants, I think we all need to take a deep dive into our communication process. This includes everything from the timing of when new plants are released, to how and when we decide what to grow, to how we communicate this with our customers. This is one of our goals going forward, and we look forward to hearing more from you about what we can do to make this process work better for everyone.

New Year, New Perennials

MARIANI PLANTS