Osmanthus heterophyllus 'Rotundifolius'

Among the false hollies, 'Rotundifolius' is the gentle contrarian. Where the species arms the youthful leaves with fierce holly spines, this old form lays them down entirely: the leaves are small, thick, and rounded, nearly circular and spineless, a heavy, puckered dark green that reads more like boxwood or a miniature bergenia than an osmanthus. The oddity is the whole appeal, a curiosity that stops a plantsman mid-path.

The name heterophyllus, Greek for different-leaved, describes the whole clan, whose spiny juvenile foliage smooths to entire margins with age, but 'Rotundifolius' takes the smoothing to its logical end. A dense, exceptionally slow grower building to perhaps eight feet over many years, the shrub is native to Japan, where the species is sometimes still listed under the old name Osmanthus ilicifolius. Woodlanders offers the plant as an interesting and uncommon evergreen, a touch less cold hardy than the ordinary false hollies and best suited to zones 8 and 9.

The false hollies have long served as guardians in Japanese and Chinese gardens, the spiny leaves hung at doorways to turn away misfortune, yet even the spineless 'Rotundifolius' keeps the family's other gift: in fall, hidden among the rounded leaves, come tiny waxy white flowers with the sweet apricot perfume that makes the whole genus beloved. Scent, not show, is the reward.

Use 'Rotundifolius' where the curious foliage can be met at close range and puzzled over: beside a path, a gate, or an entry, in a rock garden, a low informal hedge, or a collector's bed among finer-textured companions that set off the heavy leaf. Give sun to part shade and moist, well-drained soil, and the patience a slow shrub asks. The dense evergreen frame is generally passed over by deer, and needs little more than an occasional light shaping.