Forget Honeysuckle: The Fragrant White Flowers That Smell Like Your Favorite Candle

Having a sweet-smelling summer garden is what dreams are made of, but outside of honeysuckle, there are other fragrant flowering shrubs worth knowing about. Vanilla Spice summersweet (Clethra alnifolia 'Caleb') is a shrub of creamy-white flowers that appear in upright spikes in midsummer and releases a very sweet fragrance. The name itself might give away that it has a vanilla scent to it, although the smell is a little more complex than just that, with hints of spice, cloves, and even root beer according to some. It has other names too, such as "sweet pepperbush" or even more curiously, "poor man's soap." Talk about a fresh and clean fragrance. 

This plant is all about the flowers. — it has large blooms and each flower spike can reach 10 to 12 inches long. The shrub itself can grow to 3 to 6 feet (even up to 8 foot in some cases), so it is perfect to fill in borders. And the timing of its blooms is what makes this shrub particularly useful. It flowers in July and August, with the blooms lasting for around four to six weeks, so it could still be in bloom through to October when many other summer plants are beginning to look a little worse for wear.

Vanilla Spice summersweet naturally grows in damp places like wet woods, or at the edge of streams and marshy areas, so in the garden, you just need to make sure it has consistently moist soil and full sun to partial shade. Native to North America, it is hardy in USDA Zones 4 through 8, making it suitable for a pretty broad stretch of the country. 

And there's another reason why Vanilla Spice summersweet fits nicely into your garden if your priority is good scents. This is a flower that plays well with other plants and is suitable for mass planting, it can sit among more colorful perennials without taking away any attention and its glossy green leaves also provide some nice leafy visuals. It'll also attracts the beneficial bees you want in your garden as well as butterflies and hummingbirds who can't resist its sweet smell. And that sweet smell is beneficial beyond attracting pollinators. It's one of the flowers that can help mask fertilizer smell or similar odors you need covering up in your yard. In order to actually enjoy its fragrances, plant it somewhere people actually pass by or sit down near, such as a patio, deck, garden path, or an area beneath an open window.