Heuchera Gets a Bold New Look: Meet Fyre Wing

Few perennials have reinvented themselves as completely as Heuchera — and the variety that stopped me at Cultivate ’26 looks less like Coral Bells than a fern that wandered into the wrong family.

Twenty years ago, Heuchera — most gardeners know it as Coral Bells — was grown for its airy flower spikes. The leaves were an afterthought.

Modern breeding flipped that completely. Today’s Heucheras are foliage plants first: caramels, ambers, near-blacks, silvers. The flowers became the bonus.

And then there’s Fyre Wing.

The leaves are so dramatically serrated they look sculpted — deeply cut, almost feathered, with a texture traditional Coral Bells simply don’t have. Where most Heucheras read as a tidy mound of rounded leaves, this one reads as movement.

It should start reaching garden centers as production ramps up for the 2027–2028 season — a variety worth putting on the watch list now.

Versatility is the whole story. Heucheras deliver season-long foliage color in exactly the places most flowering perennials give up:

• ✓ Shade gardens
• ✓ Morning-sun beds
• ✓ Mixed containers
• ✓ Woodland landscapes

Even out of bloom, they keep adding texture and color from spring to snowfall.

Heucheras are generally hardy throughout the state. To help them return year after year:

• ✓ Plant in well-drained soil — drainage matters more than richness
• ✓ Avoid spots that stay wet through winter
• ✓ Mulch lightly after the ground freezes, not before
• ✓ Divide older plants every few years if crowns begin lifting

Morning sun with afternoon shade usually produces the richest foliage color.

Bottom line: flowers come and go, but beautiful foliage lasts the whole season. That’s why Heuchera keeps climbing my list of favorite perennial groups — and why Fyre Wing was one of the plants I photographed first at the show.

Reference: Cultivate ’26 (AmericanHort, Columbus OH) · Schlegel Greenhouse show-floor notes