This is what the beautiful pink clematis Piilu looks like.

A lovely clematis is flowering in my garden now. Many of my readers write to me when they see the flowers in the background of my pictures, they want to know what it's called. Well, I thought I would do you one better and write a whole post about it. This is my large-flowered clematis variety Piilu.

Piilu is an early clematis variety that produces beautiful pink and white flowers. They can flower on both the shoots from this year and last year which means plenty of flowers. My Piilu grows on a post by my bicycle fence. It looks so beautiful! I'm hoping that cathedral bells will start growing here too.

The red clematis is called Red Cardinal.

This variety can grow to around six feet (2 meters) tall, but mine is mostly just climbing on my old rusty bikes.

Maintenance and pruning

I don't really prune this clematis, I just clean it up a little when it starts looking a bit worse for wear. When it does, I just cut the whole plant without really caring about the rules. It will grow back up just fine, it just won't grow as large as it was the first time. If you want to do it according to the book though, you should remove the dead parts in spring and then cut the smaller shoots down to a few inches.

I'm growing Piilu right in the middle of my kitchen garden. The soil is great, mainly because I do a lot of mulching here. I don't use any other fertilizer for my clematis. The mulch seems to work really well though.

Read more about flowers: How to start a flower garden

The Piilu flower petals are light pink with darker streaks in the middle.

Info

• Piilu is supposed to be very hardy, even in zone 4
• sunny/partial shade is optimal
• flowers from May to September
• Piilu belongs to pruning group 2
• grows to around 6 feet (2 meters) tall

More about flowers: Self-sown summer flowers

Piilu mainly flowers in June and July, but it has a short flowering period later in summer too.

Everything about this flower is just beautiful.

I'm growing my Piilu clematis along one of the main pathways in my garden. I would like to grow one on the other side too!

I have three other clematis varieties in my garden. I planted Red Cardinal in the same spot as Piilu, and I also have a blue Jackmanii and a large-flowered white variety that I don't remember the name of right now. I will fill you in as soon as I remember it. Clematis is so lovely, I think I will buy a few more plants for my kitchen garden.
/Sara Bäckmo