When the light and colour of Christmas is packed away it's inspiring to turn to the brightness and promise of seed catalogues.

In these, a trend continues towards flowers that are frilled, lacinated, doubled, bi-coloured or show unusual colours. Also popular are dwarf versions of favourite plants and/or perennials that flower in their first year.

The hollyhock 'Majorette Mixed,' listed by Thompson and Morgan (T&M) falls into both categories since it's only 36" (1m) tall and is said to flower the first year from seed.

Compact gaillardias, such as the AAS winners 'Arizona Sun' and 'Arizona Apricot' listed by T&T Seeds grow just 12" (30cm) high and are described as bushy and long-flowering.

Peach is definitely in this year at T&M) who are offering the pale 'Peach Sorbet' California Poppy, the 'Candy Mountain Peach' foxglove and the AAS winner Portulaca 'Sundial Peach.' Then there is the double antirrhinum 'Twinny Peach' listed as growing just 10-12" (25-30cm).

Bee-lovers may be interested in the write-up of 'Twinny Peach'' which explains: "The blooms are so double and tightly closed that bees are unable to enter, which prolongs the flowering period and adds to the outstanding performance of 'Twinny Peach." Bees have problems with many double flowers.

Other colourful AAS winners from T&M include the nicotiniana 'Perfume Deep Purple,' and a fiery red and yellow zinnia 'Zowie! Yellow Flame.' Another unusual colour comes from William Dam which offers a lysimachia 'Beaujolais' which has deep red gooseneck flower stems. It's not the invasive species, the listing says

Amaranthus is hot this year, not just as a vegetable, but also for its long-lasting spikes of tiny cream, coppery or yellowish flowers. T&T Seeds lists a spectacular foliage amaranth 'Tricolor' with yellow, green and red leaves and another amaranth 'Aurora' where creamy-yellow upper leaves rise above dark green lower ones.

T&T is among those offering a yellow impatiens 'Jungle Gold.' It's described as having orchid-like flowers and deep green foliage. It's said to grow 16" (40cm) tall and 14" (25cm) wide. Another interesting impatiens is the orange flowered 'Divine Orange Bronze Leaf' from OSC. This is a strapping one - 2' (60cm) tall and 18" (45cm) wide.

Veyseys and several others are listing the AAS-winning osteospermum 'Asti White' reputed to resist light frost. T&T offers this and its sibling: 'Asti Purple.'

Sunflowers get lots of space almost everywhere: some are heirloom such as the red 'Velvet Queen' or the huge 'Mammoth Russian.' Many are multi-branching, or pollen-free or dwarf or all of these together such as 'Junior' listed by Veyseys.

Unusual colours include the dark mahogany 'Claret' (Wm. Dam.) and the white 'Moonshadow' (Dominion). Veyseys offers several other untypical sunflower colours which are closing in on the truly unusual. These include 'Peach Passion,' 'Jade' and the 'Ruby Eclipse' which approaches pink.

Then there's a truly monstrous sunflower - 'King Kong' (Dominion) is said to stand 16' (5m) tall and produce masses of seed.

People who like green flowers might be interested in the aster 'Hulk' (Dominion) or the chartreuse zinnia 'Green Lime' (T&M). Friends of black leaves might care for the ornamental pepper 'Black Pearl' (Dominion) which produces black leaves when exposed to sun. The black fruit which turns red at maturity is fiery hot.