PlantFiles: Silver Leafed Princess Flower
Tibouchina heteromalla

Large, fuzzy, silver leaves are fun to touch and attractive even when no blooms are present. Excessive flowering spikes tend to render the plant top-heavy; have had to stake until blooming ceases and can be pruned. Takes great will power to cut back its healthy foliage for a fuller shape. Otherwise it grows quickly and can become spindly.

Just when you start to worry about its excessive dropping of leaves, it puts out new shoots at the base and comes right back.

Enjoys morning sun, afternoon shade in zone 9b.

A special addition to your yard since it is not overused or commonly found in chain garden centers.

This plant is indeed finicky. In hotter places like Houston, it seems impossible to overwater during the summer. I have not had any success with fertilizer. I just leave them alone and keep them watered and mulched. I've had the best success in pots, which can be moved around to accommodate it's light requirements as the sun position changes during the seasons. It seems easy to propegate from branches, but I've never seen it go to seed. I noticed in Costa Rica it grows well in volcanic soil.

Everyone loves the leaves of this plant and wants to touch them! It seems a bit finicky, though; our coastal Northern CA (Sunset zone 17) is probably as far north/east as it will tolerate. Too much sun and the leaves burn slightly; too cold in winter and it just sits there unhappily. Leaf drop of up to 25% is considered normal with this plant. Leaves that die turn a spectacular orange and yellow before dropping off, so it's actually quite pretty while shedding leaves. An acid fertilizer is recommended. Flowers are not as spectacularly large as T. urvilleana, being smaller and held on spikes, but the color is just as intense and quite beautiful.