Click below to listen to my 2 min. Garden Bite radio show/podcast: 2023 AAS winners – Annuals
It’s that time of year! Sharing AAS winners for 2023. All America Selections are truly the best of the best having been trialed by numerous horticulture professionals in blind trials.
Today I’m sharing some spectacular new annuals that will be available next year. First up may be my favorite. It’s a colocasia in the Royal Hawaiian series. This one is named ‘Waikiki’.
This gorgeous elephant ear’s leaves are deep, glossy green with white markings and vivid pink veins sitting on burgundy stems. It grows to about 36 inches in full sun to semi-shade. It holds it’s color even after a light frost!
This next plant is also a foliage winner. It’s a coleus called ‘Coral Candy’.
This is the first seed coleus to ever win the coveted AAS Winner designation! Coral Candy’s unique, multicolored foliage displays beautifully on a uniformly compact plant. Narrow, serrated leaves drape down the mounded plants. AAS Judges noted that this variety holds its color well, even when grown in full sun. It grows 10 to 16 inches and looks beautiful in a hanging basket too.
Snapdragons are an old-fashioned favorite annual and this new 2023 AAS winner will definitely be a hit. From the Doubleshot series it’s called ‘Orange bicolor’ and will add romance to your garden.
Look at that color!! The stunning open-faced double flowers emerge in beautiful warm shades of orange and orange-red that transition to a dusty shade as they age. AAS Judges across the country were impressed with the strong stems that produced more branches resulting in a higher flower count. These stems produced romantic flowers all season long (even in lower light conditions) that didn’t break off in strong winds.