Lipstick Palm Cyrtostachys renda

Nothing else in cultivation looks like a lipstick palm. The crownshaft and leaf sheaths are scarlet, glowing against green fronds, and because the palm suckers into a multi stemmed clump a single planting gives you a whole group of red stems rather than one. The fronds are pinnate and held fairly upright on slender stems. It is a feature plant, used in tropical courtyards, resort landscapes and heated atriums where it can be seen from close range and lit at night, and it earns that position on colour alone.

The climate this palm insists on

Ask whether it can be grown in Sydney or Perth and the answer is no, with no trick that changes it. Cyrtostachys renda comes from the peat swamps of the Malay Peninsula, Borneo and Sumatra, and it is strictly tropical: it wants constant heat and high humidity, and a cool winter alone leaves it sitting and sulking. That is the failure mode, stated plainly. Cold is what kills this palm, and a single genuine cold snap will end an established clump that has taken years to build. Far north Queensland, or a heated interior with humidity, is the honest range. Within that range, give it shelter, because wind shreds the leaflets and the whole effect depends on clean fronds, so a courtyard or a position among other palms works far better than an open lawn. Soil should be deep, rich and heavy with organic matter, and mulched thickly. Humidity is the part people underestimate: in a dry inland garden with hot afternoons and cold nights, the leaflets brown along the edges even where the temperature never reaches freezing.

Lipstick palm compared with the other clumpers

If the climate is not tropical, buy Pinanga coronata instead and accept a different kind of colour: mottled bronze and maroon in the new leaf rather than red stems, on a palm that will actually live through a subtropical winter. That is the single most useful comparison on this page, and it saves more plants than any care tip. Kentiopsis oliviformis is the other option for a warm garden that wants a palm with presence, and it stands on one trunk rather than clumping. Choose the lipstick palm only if you garden in the wet tropics or you are planting inside a controlled environment. More stock in advanced trees.

Feeding a hungry clump

Remove fronds only when they are fully spent, cutting clear of the coloured crownshaft, because a nick there stays visible for the life of that stem. Thin the oldest stems out at ground level from time to time so the red is not buried inside a congested clump. New suckers appear at the base through the warm months and can be left in place to thicken the group. Feed generously through the warm months with a complete palm fertiliser carrying magnesium and potassium, plus a trace element mix, and mulch the whole root area. Yellowing older fronds on this palm almost always mean it is hungry rather than sick, so check the feeding history before reaching for anything else.

Choosing a size

This plant is available in 7 sizes, from 180mm up to 100L, priced from $159.00 to $1549.00 per plant. The size shown is the pot the plant arrives in, which is the rootball, not the height of the plant. The smaller pots hold younger plants that cost less each and establish quickly, which suits hedges, screens and mass planting where the plant count adds up. The larger sizes carry several more years of growth on the farm and give height and presence straight away, which is what you want for a single feature position or a screen that cannot wait. Not sure which to choose? Read our guide to when to plant in Australia.