Magnolia liliflora flowers

Today I am going to cheat - and let the photo do the talking.
It is Magnolia liliflora nigra. A magnificently dark purple, flask-shaped flower, with a perfect bud form, emerging from the deliciously hairy protective covering (bract).

This is a plant which I salvaged from my Father's garden, in Canberra, as a sucker from the original plant which was growing in his garden. My own plant is now developing nicely, in its fourth year. It is over head height already, but it started out as a single stick about waist high (with a few roots attached when I lifted it, originally). I did not count the flowers today, but each of these shots is of a different flower, at a slightly later stage of development. So, it is flowering quite well for a relatively young plant.Click on the image to see the large-sized image, to enjoy these flowers.

• Colour
• texture
• form.
• No perfume, that's the only drawback.
  

This plant has medium sized flowers, in the range of the deciduous Magnolia flowers. It is not a huge flower, as some are. When the image is enlarged, the photo should be approximately the same size as the flower, in real life - about 5 inches high. Obviously this depends upon your monitor size.