A vigorous evergreen climber allied to L. periclymenum and L. etrusca, making growths up to 6 ft or more long in a single season. Leaves on the flowering shoots oval to oblong, 1 to 11⁄2 in. long, glabrous and glaucous, all sessile and the upper pairs connate; leaves on the extension growths smaller and stalked. Inflorescences glandular, sessile, with three to five whorls of flowers. Corolla 1 to 11⁄2 in. long, reddish purple and glandular on the outside, yellowish white within. Flowering season June to August. Bot. Mag., t. 9517.
Native of Spain; introduced about 1880. It differs from the common woodbine in having the upper pairs of leaves connate; from L. etrusca in having the flowers in a terminal stalkless spike, springing directly from the uppermost pair of leaves; and from both in its glaucous leaves and glandular inflorescences. This beautiful plant, which fully deserves its specific epithet, is not common in gardens but is hardy on a south-facing wall. There is a fine specimen in the National Trust garden at Sissinghurst in Kent.