Viburnum japonicum

Carl Peter Thunberg, the Swedish physician who talked his way onto the Dutch trading island of Dejima in 1775 and used the post to become one of the first Europeans to seriously botanize a closed Japan, is the one who first described this plant to science. Richard Oldham, the last of the great Kew collectors, gathered it again near Nagasaki in 1862 and called it, a little dismissively, "a small tree on the hills." In a garden they never quite get that ambition out of their system, settling instead into a sturdy, slow evergreen bush.

The leaves are the first thing you notice: thick, glossy, dark green, leathery enough to look lacquered. Turn one over and you'll find the underside finely stippled with tiny dark dots, a quiet diagnostic that tells you you're holding the real thing and not Viburnum odoratissimum, with which it has been muddled in gardens for more than a century. Early summer brings rounded clusters of white flowers carrying a true jonquil sweetness, the kind of scent that travels across a yard; red berries follow and hang on well past the leaves.

Slow is the operative word, and patience is the cost of admission. Hardy to zone 7, content in sun or near-full shade, happiest set against a warm wall where the cold can't find it. They remain uncommon in American gardens and are likely to stay that way, which is most of the reason to grow one.

Standing on: It was described by Thunberg (the authority is (Thunb.) Spreng.) and is native to Japan, the Ryukyus, Zhejiang in China, and a South Korean island. Richard Oldham collected it in Nagasaki in 1862 and described it as "a small tree on the hills," and it has long been confused with V. odoratissimum, distinguishable by veins running to the leaf margin and a rounded, umbel-like inflorescence. The flowers carry a jonquil-like scent. It is slow-growing, with glossy leaves bearing tiny dark dots on the undersides, fragrant white flowers in early summer, and persistent red berries. Hardy to about USDA zone 7.