While I was at Kew Gardens back in June, I saw several passionflowers that were in some of the rather impressive glasshouses around the gardens. The one that I am talking about today is Passiflora ‘Connor Cailean’, which I this is my favourite of the ones I saw that sunny June day.

There isn’t much information on this particular cultivar, which is a shame really. What I can say is that the parents of this plants are Passiflora loefgrenii which is the female parent and Passiflora cearulea being the male parent.

The stems on this passionflower are round and a dark red colour when mature. The leaves are rather typical for the genus, with between three and five lobes on them. They can reach 10 cm long by 12 cm wide.

The flowers are the star of the show. The petals and sepals purple/violet in colour with the corolla filaments being a really deep purple colour at the base, turning to white and blue towards the ends.

The breeder was Robert McPhail, back in 2005, who named it after Connor McPhail, who is the godson of the breeder.

For anyone interested, the name Passiflora comes from two Latin words. Passio means passion and flos that means flower. This refers to the fact that passionflowers have a symbolic resemblance to certain aspects of the crucifixion of Christ.

There is no more that I can really say about this delightfully flowered plant, apart from the fact that I wish it was more available so that I could grow it myself. I will have more of a look around for it and have a go if I can find some seeds.

https://profiles.ala.org.au/opus/fda/profil/passiflora

https://passiflorasociety.org/wpcontent/uploads/r0124.pdf