Lobelia tupa

Lobelia Tupa.
Left - Tall spikes with the individual flowers held at a stylish angle, looking good arising from this composition, and echoed by the spikes of Acanthus in the background.
Right - This herbaceous plant is impressive in leaf as well as flower. It's dense clump of foliage is a mid green and shoots from the rootstock as soon as the frosts have finished growing to about 80cm tall, this clump is growing in Logan Botanical Garden on the west coast of Scotland.  A mature clump can cover about 1.5 sq m as the many branches lean forward from the base of the plant. In a warm summer it will flower for months from about June onwards producing numerous tall spikes of many individual flowers, adding about another 40cm to the height of the plant.

Left - There seems to be some variation in the flower colours within the species - this one being orange. 
Right - this is the deepest maroon flower we have seen, you can see its velvet sheen here. A native of Chile which is surprisingly hardy, and easy to grow withstanding  -10c seemingly happy in light shade as well as full sun. Its main failing can be excessive leaf growth and leaning which is usually caused by growing it in a soil which is too rich, we try to plant it in a poor sandy fairly well drained soil. All parts of the plant are poisonous.