The lovely British native "Scarlet pimpernel" is too often overlooked, but closer inspection of the flower and seed capsule will reveals the fact that it is in fact in the primula family! Its stemless scarlet-red flowers appear over a very long succession all summer long. When allowed to naturalise in a hot place it will surpass many of the more common alpine plants, and it will even send out its long, leafy prostrate stems where others will not, such as on hot dry banks and rockeries. ... Learn More

One of the compact mossy kinds of androsace, this dwarf alpine from the Caucasus mountains forms small rosettes of deeply-toothed oval leaves and dense heads of pale pink flowers from April to July and is best in an alpine house or on a dry rockery. ... Learn More

A choice and hardy alpine forming low cushions of pointed leaves with short-stemmed, yellow-eyed fragrant pink flowers in spring and early summer. This dwarf plant from the Alps and Pyrenees is ideal for the alpine house or alpine trough where it will gently spread for many years. ... Learn More

This tiny "Rock Jasmine" has small loose rosettes of dark green leaves, with short stems bearing clusters of white flowers. It is excellent for a trough or raised bed and does not need winter protection. It is a fairly easy-to-grow plant when established in sun to part shade in gritty, sharply drained soil. ... Learn More

This is one of the choicer dwarf species and is also one of the easier to grow. A tiny plant, very much like Androsace ciliata, it comes from the same regions in the Pyrenees, where it forms mossy tufts of rounded cone-like columns, each less than an inch high, covered thickly with hairs, with white flowers nestling in the centre during April and May. ... Learn More

An exceptionally lovely and easy Tibetan gem. Could be mistaken for a primula, with sprays of pink flowers in succession from spring to autumn. Most attractive rounded hairy leaves on thin stems (predictably rather like small geranium leaves). An outstanding plant in all respects. ... Learn More

Beautiful, dainty, five-petalled, yellow-eyed, rosy-pink flowers appear in late spring on this rare and delicate cushion plant. Although it is totally frost hardy, it will do best either in tufa, a sheltered rock garden or a pot in the alpine house, where its flowers will retain their perfection. In the wild it is found mainly on alpine grass and rocks in the high peaks of the Massif Central, and more rarely in the Vosges, the Cevennes, the eastern Pyrenees and the Cantabrian Mountains. ... Learn More

Quite similar to A. obtusifolia, this diminutive plant has rosettes only to 1.5cm across with narrower leaves and flowers are usually salmon pink and only occasionally white. It is native to the Central Balkans where it lives in screes, moraines and short grassland, at 2000-3000m. Very easy to accommodate, it simply requires a well-drained, acidic soil. ... Learn More

This strong-growing plant makes tight rosettes of shining green leaves, and in spring large white flowers with a yellow centre, in broad loose clusters of five or six. It will do best in a gravel bed or scree with good drainage, and will usually self seed freely around. In the wild it inhabits limestone rocks from 3000 to 4500 feet, from the Cevennes through the Alps into Austria. ... Learn More

From narrow-leaved rosettes arise long slender stems carrying fountains of pure white flowers. A charming annual member of the primula family which will actually self-seed when happy. ... Learn More

This robust and easily grown plant forms cushioned tufts made of large rosettes of spoon-shaped leaves fringed by fine hairs, and short downy stems carrying from one to six white or rosy flowers with a yellow eye. It grows at over 1600m in the Alps and Carpathians. ... Learn More

One of the very loveliest alpines, often winning prizes at shows, this gem makes tight domes of hairy grey-green leaves, beneath almost stemless sessile white flowers in spring. It is of easy culture in crevices of sandy soil or pot culture in an Alpine house. Very, very few seeds ever collected. ... Learn More

This delightful dwarf member of the primrose family, also called the pygmy flower or rock jasmine, grows high on the the Fell Fields of California, where it produces small rosettes of crinkled leaves from which arise thin stems carrying small yellow-eyed, creamy white flowers. ... Learn More

Androsace strigillosa has neat rosettes of small leaves in winter, and much larger leaves in summer. It has upright stems with a loose umbel of a few flowers, white when they are open. But what makes this highly sought after is the reverse of the petals, seen also in bud, which is a deep, dusky pink, outlined with white. It has grown well outside for many years, eventually making a wide clump. A variable species forming loose clumps or hummocks depending on altitude. Central Himalaya (Nepal to Bhutan) above 2500m in light woodland and among scrub, smaller forms higher up in alpine meadows ... Learn More

A beautiful, long-lived plant bearing golden-eyed, creamy-white flowers in spring and early summer on shortish stems holding jaggedly bisected leaves. It grows, predictably, on Mount Baldo in Italy! ... Learn More