plant named ‘Sultry Night’

Botanical denomination:hybrid.

Variety denomination: ‘Sultry Night’.

The first public introduction of‘Sultry Night’ was a brief description and photograph on Feb. 1, 2025, on a website maintained by Walters Gardens, Inc. Subsequently, on Jun. 3, 2025, Walters Gardens, Inc. introduced the new plant in the “Walters Gardens 2025-2026 Catalog” with a brief description and photograph. The first offer for sale of the new plant was by Walters Gardens, Inc. to North Coast Perennials on Oct. 15, 2024. Walters Gardens, Inc. obtained the new plant and information about the new plant directly from the inventor. No plants of‘Sultry Night’ have been sold or offered for sales in this country or anywhere in the world, nor has any disclosure of the new plant been made more than one year prior to the filing date of this application, and such sale or disclosure within one year was either derived directly or indirectly from the inventor.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Coral Bells in the Saxifragaceae family and given the cultivar name of ‘Sultry Night’. ‘Sultry Night’ was hybridized by the inventor on Mar. 3, 2022, in the greenhouses of a wholesale perennial nursery in Zeeland, Michigan, USA and assigned the breeder code 22-7-6 in the trial period. The seed or female parent was the proprietary, unreleased and unnamed hybrid assigned the breeder code 21-4-4 (not patented); the male parent was ‘TNHEUFR’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 29,644.

‘Sultry Night’ was first selected in the fall of 2023 and passed final evaluation in the fall of 2024 from among thousands of other seedlings from the same cross and other crosses. ‘Sultry Night’ has been asexually propagated by basal shoot cuttings at the same nursery in Zeeland, MI in 2023 and by careful shoot tip tissue culture propagation, and the resultant plants have remained stable and continued to exhibit the same characteristics as the original plant for multiple generations.

‘Sultry Night’ differs from its parents as well as all other coral bells known to the applicant in the following combined traits:

The most similar cultivars known to the inventor are: ‘Bella Notte’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 24,291, ‘Black Beauty’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 13,288, ‘Black Pearl’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 29,395, ‘Black Taffeta’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 26,162, ‘Obsidian’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 14,836, ‘Timeless Night’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 32,134, and ‘Wildberry’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 31,222.

‘Bella Notte’ has flatter leaves with no ruffling of the foliage, the top surface is not as shiny, the coloration is more magenta without the lighter purplish-red overlay between the veins. ‘Black Beauty’ has a slightly larger habit with slightly larger leaves and the foliage color tends to be a lighter reddish-purple. ‘Black Pearl’ has larger leaves with less cupping, less wavy margins, without the lighter purplish-red overlay between the veins, and the flowers are cream-colored. ‘Black Taffeta’ has smaller leaves with more incised margins and the flowers are cream-colored. ‘Obsidian’ has smaller habit, smaller and flatter foliage with shallower incisions between the lobes, and the flowers are creamy-white. ‘Timeless Night’ has flatter foliage that is less dissected between the lobes, the leaves are purplish-black without the lighter purplish-red overlay between the veins, and it flowers more profusely on shorter panicles. ‘Wildberry’ has foliage that is smaller, flatter, less dissected, and more purplish in color and not as dark.

In comparison to the new plant, the female parent has leaves that are darker greyed-purple and more wavy margins. The male parent has leaves are flatter and less ruffled, and more purplish-red.

The following description is based on two-year-old plants growing in a lightly shaded greenhouse in Zeeland, Michigan, USA. The new plant has not been grown under all possible environments and may phenotypically appear different under different conditions such as light, temperatures, fertilizer, and water, without any difference in genotype. The color descriptions used are from the 2015 edition of The Royal Horticultural Society Colour Chart except where common dictionary terms are used.