"Walking down the garden path on a sultry afternoon in late July, I met a fragrance that took some time to trace. It was the mountain summersweet, Clethra acuminata, a delicate, elusive perfume that comes and goes with the breeze."
Elizabeth Lawrence, the Charlotte Observer, November 30, 1969
The summersweet to which Elizabeth refers is still in her garden, just beginning to reveal its first delicate fragrant blooms. I experienced the same wonder she describes on a hot July afternoon two years ago as I walked down her garden path. The fragrance is said to smell like heliotrope, but I agree with Elizabeth—it is more like vanilla. It's a scent of which I never tire.
Come delight in the fragrance—and many blooms—of July in Elizabeth Lawrence’s garden!
As always, I am...
Yours in Dirt,
Andrea