Tradescantia 'Sweet Kate'

Discovered by Hazel Stevens in her garden in Kent, UK, as a chance sport beneath her apple tree, she named it after her daughter and asked for all her royalties to go to the McIndoe Burns Unit, a charity that cared for badly burned airmen after WII. A slow-spreading groundcover, it is not invasive like many of its relatives, but if left in situ, Tradescantia 'Sweet Kate' will naturalise in part-shade with adequate moisture. The striking purple flowers of this compact spiderwort last for only a day, but blooming is continuous from late spring, right through summer into autumn with regular deadheading. A feature of spiderworts is the viscous secretion released when stems are cut, becoming thread-like and silky upon hardening, like a spider's web.