Hollies

Evergreen structure and a winter full of berries. Hollies are the dependable backbone of the Southern garden, holding glossy leaves and bright fruit through the coldest months when they matter most.

32 plants in this collection

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About the Hollies Collection

Hollies are the evergreen (and a few deciduous) shrubs and trees of the genus Ilex, grown for dense, year-round foliage and the berries that follow their small spring flowers. Tough, adaptable, and long-lived, they range from towering pyramidal trees to fine-leaved shrubs that clip into hedge or topiary, and from the familiar spiny-leaved kinds to the soft, small-leaved yaupons and their relatives. On most, it takes a female plant, and a male nearby, to set the winter crop of red, orange, or black fruit.

In the landscape hollies are the great problem-solvers. They screen and hedge, take shearing without complaint, anchor a foundation planting, and give evergreen weight to a border in every season. In winter the berries carry the show, lighting a bare garden and standing out against the dark leaves, and the whole plant reads as neat and furnished when little else does.

We grow hollies for their toughness and their outsized value to wildlife. The berries feed birds deep into winter, when other food is scarce; the dense evergreen cover shelters nesting and roosting birds; and the spring flowers, easy to overlook, are rich in nectar for early pollinators. Native hollies in particular earn their place twice over, as garden structure and as habitat.

Give them sun to part shade and reasonable drainage, and plant a pollinating partner if you want berries. For more evergreen framework see our Conifers, pair with our Large Shrubs for a mixed screen, and find the native kinds among our Southeastern Natives.