Ilex x meserveae 'BLUE PRINCESS' blue holly, Meserve holly - female

Blue Princess is probably the most popular female variety of blue hollies. It flowers abundantly in the spring and fruits are born in the autumn. They are bright red, shiny berries that remain on the plant until early to mid spring. To produce fruits it needs a male pollinator
e.g. Blue Prince® or Casanova.

The leaves are glossy, medium sized (4x2cm) and finely, not dangerously toothed. Their colour is deep green, almost blue-green with purple margins. Branches are violet. It is a female variety which grows much faster than its parent Blue Prince ®, forming a dense shrub, ideal for hedging. Under good conditions it can make 50 cm per year, or even 80 cm in humid climate with milder winters.

Meserveae hollies are called “blue hollies” thanks to the shade of the species leaves that are dark green with bluish tint. And the name meserveae was chosen for its cultivator, Kathleen Meserve, who, literally on her windowsill, made a cross of ilex rugosa and ilex aquifolium in 1950´s to achieve excellent cold hardiness on a fabulously foliaged evergreen plant. She died in 1999 at the age of 93 but left behind an impressive line of these evergreen superbly hardy varieties.


Blue hollies need almost no maintenance if you provide them with slightly acidic soil at the beginning and enough moisture for the first couple of years to enable establishing extensive root system. They are beautiful and trouble-free dense shrubs with no defoliated twigs even without pruning. They grow moderately fast and make dense foliage in the lower parts while they push new branches upwards. This feature is employed when using this holly into a hedge.

Another huge advantage is its above mentioned hardiness. It can stand very low temperatures without any damage. It is hardy to -29°C (USDA zone 5).

Last update 12-01-2008.