Cotswold Aeoniums

Popular, rare, lost or forgotten…..

Updated June 1st 2026

I’ve been growing cacti and succulents to some extent for most of my life. In recent years, I’ve been drawn “hook line and sinker” towards Aeoniums, in particular dark leaved cultivars. I’ve started the application process of setting up a Plant Heritage National Collection, with much encouragement from another NC collection holder.

“But all the dark ones look the same”, I hear you say. Well, there is a little truth in this but the subtle variations can make a big difference to their survival in this commercial plant production world.

The thing about cultivars is that when specialists growers and nurseries attempt to produce a new plant that “the world has not seen before”, there are often winners and losers. This is where the “how many red ones do we need?” comment comes into play, resulting in a few decent cultivars getting left behind, becoming rare in collections.

Cultivars created in the UK, Europe and USA have been the result of cross pollinations taking two parent plants in flower and hoping to produce a new version; the best of both. Often the results provide seed which, when germinated, produces a mix of plants the best, or potentially new cultivars, are further propagated or even hybridised again. Some cultivars can be slow to grow or don’t offset freely also making them less desirable to commercials growers.

One thing that can also be challenging is that enthusiastic home growers or even professional nurseries can sometimes get muddled up with similar looking plants they propagate. Inevitably, labels do get mixed up and plant ID’s get incorrectly attributed.

My project here is to come up with a list of currently available well known, rare, “lost” or forgotten dark leaved Aeoniums and save them for future enthusiasts to enjoy. There are only a small number of people and trusted nurseries where the data can be drawn from. One of the key sources of this information can be found in the new Aeonium publication by Mellie Lewis, one of the most knowledgeable collectors in the UK.

In this process, my list will contain very few hybrids from Asia. These are often be produced using less conventional propagation treatments. Regardless, they can produce some stunning variegated results for the commercial mass markets. Personally, I have found that they can often be tricky to grow compared to others and don’t always come true from further cuttings.

There are few dark leaved Aeoniums that can be found in habitat. In the main, most are the result of hybridisation. Of course, in habitat nature is hard at work doing its own cross pollination, which can produce new looking plants of interest. If you’ve been to Cornwall or the Scilly Isles, you’ll have seen lots of Aeoniums including many that have made their own hybrid versions, making accurate ID quite difficult. Occasionally, a new plant is discovered, propagated and offered for sale, like Aeonium ‘Cornish Rose’ below.

So far, I have documented all the dark leaved Aeoniums I am sucessfully growing and these are shown below. This includes some wish list plants that I hope to find one day, if genuine, correctly-named plants can be obtained.

I’m not yet an “expert”, but I am learning quickly. Many of my plants need time to reach full maturity, but they are growing well, so I’m hoping that all will come good in the next few years of my journey with Aeoniums.

A key to the atributation of each cultivar is shown at the end of the plant name for each photo:

SS=Surreal Succulents, Cornwall.

OT=Ottershaw Cacti, Surrey.

JC=Jack Catlin USA

RO=Renee O’Connell USA

AP=Altman Plants USA

PP=Pemberth Plants, Cornwall.

PIC=Piccolo Plants, Devon.

MIN=Minack Garden, Cornwall.

UN=Unknown origin.

Some of the images below are young plants and I’ll update these photos periodically to reflect their current growth and appearance.

Photo gallery is a work in progress.

New cultivars introduced in 2026 (not in my collection)

And here are a few of the ‘other’ dark leaved succulents. Whilst not strictly Aeoniums, these cultivars created by Surreal Succulents in Cornwall are a cross between a Sempervivum and an Aeonium.

Trusted Aeonium Nurseries include:

Coastal Succulents in Somerset.

Ottershaw Cacti and Succulents in Surrey.

Surreal Succulents in Cornwall.

Piccolo Plants in Devon.

Thank you for taking the time to read this article and I hope it has inspired you to grow more of these incredible plants. Do contact me if you’d like to visit my collection between May and October when the plants are mostly outside and the kettle is always on.

Happy Growing 🪴

Steve Green

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.