How to Grow and Care for Sweetshrub

Carolina allspice (Calycanthus floridus) has reddish-brown flowers that have a captivating banana-strawberry fragrance. The leaves, when crushed, also have an exceedingly pleasant aroma. Both parts of the plant can be used to make potpourris. Even the bark exudes a pleasant smell.

Western sweetshrub is a large, easy-to-grow deciduous shrub that produces showy flowers with a spicy, fruity fragrance. Despite a proliferation of common names referring to its sweet and spicy scent, this plant is toxic to humans and livestock and should not be eaten.

Pollinated only by small beetles, the chinese sweetshrub is an attractive specimen plant with showy flowers often seen in foundation plantings and shrub borders. Sadly, it has become rare in its native habitat alongside mountainous streams.

Eastern sweetshrub is a deciduous shrub known for its spicy-scented, maroon to reddish-brown flowers, which bloom in spring and early summer. Featuring glossy, green to blue-green leaves, eastern sweetshrub thrives in moist, well-drained soils within forested areas or along streambanks. This variety is distinguished by its slightly glaucous, or bluish-gray, foliage which contrasts against the darker flowers.

Carolina allspice 'Aphrodite' is a cultivar bred from Carolina allspice. It is named 'Aphrodite' for its large red blooms and sweet fragrance. This is also what makes the plant different from other shrubs in the family. Another defining characteristic is that carolina allspice 'Aphrodite' produces glossy foliage that still looks gorgeous in the garden when the plant isn’t in bloom.