Scottish Country Dance of the Day

Jacarandas are among those rare trees capable of changing the character of an entire city. For a few weeks each year, their spreading branches erupt into clouds of trumpet-shaped flowers, often so profusely that the leaves seem almost incidental. When the blossoms begin to fall, the spectacle moves to ground level, carpeting streets and pavements in purple. Pretoria is especially famous for this transformation, but great avenues of jacarandas can also be found in Johannesburg, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Sydney, Brisbane and other warm-climate cities around the world.

The best-known species, Jacaranda mimosifolia, is native to subtropical South America, particularly Argentina and Bolivia. Its delicate, fern-like foliage gives the tree a wonderfully airy appearance even when it isn't flowering. Despite its strong association with places such as South Africa and Australia, the jacaranda is an introduced tree there—a particularly successful traveller that has become woven into the visual identity and seasonal traditions of cities far from its native range.

Even the word jacaranda has travelled. English acquired it through Portuguese, but the Portuguese jacarandá was itself borrowed from an Indigenous South American language, generally identified as Tupi or Guaraní. Early uses of the word did not necessarily refer exclusively to the familiar purple-flowering tree seen today; related Indigenous names were applied to South American trees valued for their wood. The botanical genus Jacaranda eventually preserved the old name, while mimosifolia means essentially “mimosa-leaved,” a reference to the tree's finely divided, feathery foliage.

And jacaranda “purple” isn't actually just one purple. Individual trees can flower in shades ranging from rich violet and blue-purple through lavender, mauve and soft lilac, with the apparent colour changing further according to light and the age of the blossom. Against a brilliant blue sky the flowers can look almost electric violet-blue; on an overcast day the same tree may appear decidedly purple.

There are rarer colour surprises as well. White-flowering forms of Jacaranda mimosifolia exist, including the cultivar commonly known as ‘Alba’, producing creamy-white blossoms instead of the familiar violet-blue. Individual trees can also vary considerably in the intensity of their colour, from very pale lavender to saturated purple-blue. Trees popularly called “pink jacarandas,” however, are not necessarily true jacarandas at all—the name is sometimes borrowed for unrelated flowering trees with a similarly spectacular display.

By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, jacarandas were being planted as ornamental street trees in suitable climates around the world. In some places their flowering became part of the local calendar. Pretoria's great purple display, for example, arrives during the South African spring examination season, giving rise to the student superstition that if a jacaranda blossom falls on your head, you'll pass your exams.

For a South American tree with a name of Indigenous origin, the jacaranda has acquired an impressive collection of adopted homes—and wherever thousands of them flower together, “jacaranda season” becomes almost a season of its own.

For more beautiful jacarando photos, click the white jacaranda!