Ilex x altaclerensis 'Golden King' (f/v)

About this cultivar:

Ilex x altaclerensis ‘Golden King’ is a distinguished female holly cultivar, celebrated for its ornamental appeal and garden performance. Despite its name suggesting otherwise, ‘Golden King’ is indeed a female variety, producing small white flowers in spring that give way to reddish-brown berries in autumn and winter. Its broad, slightly spiny leaves are dark green with bright yellow margins, occasionally featuring entirely golden leaves.

The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) has honoured ‘Golden King’ with the Award of Garden Merit (AGM), indicating its excellence for garden use. The RHS highlights its nearly spine-free foliage with wide, bright yellow margins and its dense crop of slightly brownish-red berries, noting its vigour and suitability for trimming into hedges if desired.  

The species is a hybrid cross betweenIlex aquifolium (common European holly and Ilex perado (a species native to the Canary Islands). The name, altaclerensis, refers to Highclere, the estate where the hybrid was first developed in the 1830s (also known as the setting for Downton Abbey).

• Position: Full sun, partial shade
• Soil: Almost any soil, grows well in Ballyrobert
• Flowers: May, June, July
• Other features: Grows well in Ballyrobert, Royal Horticultural Society Award of Garden Merit (RHS AGM)
• Hardiness: Fully hardy - grows well in Ballyrobert!
• Habit: Bushy
• Foliage: Evergreen
• Height: 120 - 720 cm (4 - 24 ft) (4 - 6 ft if pruned)
• Spread: 120 - 480 cm (4 - 16 ft) (4 - 6ft if pruned)
• Time to full growth: 10 to 20 years
• Plant type: Tree, shrub
• Colour: Green, yellow
• Goes well with: -

About this genus:

Ilex (i-leks) gets its name from the old Latin for and evergreen oak - it is commonly know as Holly - tra la la la la. A survivor from the last ice-age, Ilex is quite large genus, containing around 600 species of woody trees and shrubs. Hundreds of Ilex cultivars provide garden structure in the form of foundation shrubs or landscape trees, and colour from the brightly coloured winter berries or year-round foliage. Ilex is quite slow growing, but will get quite large eventually if you don't prune it. We prune ours very hard in order to make them bushier and kept them at a size we prefer.

Ilex prefers full sun, but will survive nearly as well in part sun. Although Ilex tolerates a wide range of environments and soil types, it prefers not to have wet feet, so well-drained soils are best. If berries are a must, always plant a male and a female. Many folk grow them as hedges but we prefer them as specimen plants on their own - they look fantastic all year round; remember an Ilex is not just for Christmas!