Poppy Laurens Grape

Large single cups in a saturated deep plum-purple, the colour of crushed grapes or vintage velvet, held high on slender stems at 75cm to a metre above the silver-blue foliage all the somniferum poppies share. Against that silver the purple has an almost lit quality.

It is a modern variety by poppy standards. An American gardener called Lauren selected and stabilised it in the 1990s, and it has become one of the most photographed things in a cottage border since. The pods that follow are the same big pepper-pot capsules as 'Black Peony' and 'Hungarian Blue', and they are what we grow it for here as much as the flowers; they carry a good deal of our dried work.

Sow direct where it is to flower, because the taproot will not take moving. Surface-sow uncovered, autumn for preference. Thin to 30cm when the seedlings are about 5cm tall, or the plants stay spindly and the flowers come small.

All parts are toxic except the fully dried seed. Keep it from children and pets.