When it comes to year-round botanical wardrobes, nothing is more consistently fashionable than a Japanese Stewartia (Stewartia pseudocamellia). It’s a smallish (about 25-foot), non-native tree that likes Maine and shows its appreciation by always being seasonally sartorial.
As you can see above, it’s now wearing its Burgundy-wine-colored leaf cloak, accessorized with pale green buds. Soon, the cloak will be discarded and we’ll gasp at the beauty of its shapely, textured trunk, which goes very well with snow:
In the spring, it will cloak itself in luminescent green leaves studded with subtle reddish buds:
In summer, the Stewartia likes to wear a lot of attention-getting jewelry in the form of yellow-centered white flowers.
Some think those blossoms look like camellia flowers, hence the tree’s species name (pseudocamellia), which translates to imitation camellia. (Brooklin, Maine)