Ending the first part of my daily review of the some of the most memorable plants, new and old, from last year we come to the 2016 Chelsea Flower Show favorite – the new white flowered form of Primula vialii .

Primula vialii 'Alison Holland’
As soon as I entered the showground on the Sunday morning before the show opened on the Tuesday, plantspeople were asking me: “Have you seen the new white primula?” So off I rushed to take a look – and it’s lovely. I wrote it up on my RHS New Plants blog back in June. It was shortlisted for the 2016 Chelsea Plant of The Year award.

Basically, instead of the red buds and lilac flowers of the wild Primula vialii from China, ‘Alison Holland’ has creamy green buds and cool white flowers. Gary McDermott of Harperley Hall Farm Nurseries, who introduced the plant at Chelsea, told me that it’s more vigorous and flowers for longer than the usual form. But it hates drought.

‘Alison Holland’ was found in 2011 in his garden in the north east of England by John Holland who named it for his daughter-in-law. Plants never set seed but this form has proved easy to propagate by tissue culture.
 
Primula vialii 'Alison Holland' is available in the UK from Harperley Hall Farm Nurseries.

Primula vialii 'Alison Holland' is not yet available in North America but should be soon.