My title is a bit misleading, because our covergirl (or coverboy) photo of Echinacea Sombrero® ‘Adobe Orange’ happens to be the right size to crop for today’s feature image. But although s/he’s a couple of years old, isn’t s/he a stunner?

This was only one of an Echinacea (aka coneflower) near rainbow on display for show and trial at the Gardens at Ball toured during the GWA: Association for Garden Communicators conference last week.

Garden writers are lucky. We often get sneak peeks at what’s coming to garden centres in months and years to come. One that Ball was excited about is a coneflower in the same Sombrero series called ‘Tres Amigos.’ Here it is.

‘Tres Amigos’ gets its name from the way it changes colour as the flower matures, producing three shades of red, from tomato red through something with more purple in it. The pix below give you a better idea of the change.

You might find this new option in 2019 – but keep in mind that it can be hard for all garden centres to keep up with and stock the new kids on the block. What do you think of it?