La gallocresta (Salvia viridis) semillas

This beautiful annual ornamental sage is less well-known than it deserves to be. It’s a feast for the eyes, flowering all through summer and into October. With its vibrant purple and pink bracts, Annual Clary Sage adds gorgeous splashes of colour to a flower bed and also grows very well in pots.

The scene-stealers here aren’t the plant’s flowers – which are actually rather small and unremarkable – but the highly-coloured upper leaves or bracts. Though the flowers do produce nectar, making them a favourite port of call for bees and other insects.