Caleb’s Favorite Color of the Year

It’s Dahlia Week here at Hoosier Boy — the week of the year when this particular flower steals the show in my own beds. And this year, one color has stopped me in my tracks every time I walk by it.

City Lights Lavender Pink.

Photographed in my own garden this week.

It’s just gorgeous. Soft cool lavender on the outer petals, warming to pink as you move toward the center, with a deep magenta eye that gives the whole bloom that painted, hand-finished look. It photographs even better in person.

About the City Lights series. City Lights is a garden-performance dahlia — bred for clean, well-branched plants that hold their structure all summer and keep producing bloom after bloom without flopping. The series is what I reach for when I want dahlia color without dahlia drama: no staking, no babying, no mid-summer slowdown. They earn their spot.

Looking ahead to 2027. Here’s the part I’m most excited about: a new wave of City Lights colors is coming next season, bred specifically smaller and more compact — built for containers, window boxes, and smaller pots where the current series can outgrow its welcome. Same painted-petal personality, sized for the porch. I’ll have more on those varieties as we get closer to spring ’27.

For now, here’s everything I’ve written about dahlias this season — how to pick the right one at the garden center, where they actually perform best, how to keep them blooming, and whether it’s worth trying to save the tubers. Scroll on.