I had such hopes -- but this is an Ex-Plant now. It did not survive winter in its container on the porch. Here's my brief experience:I got a 'Florida Sunshine' anise plant from Wayside Gardens in 2014.
The foliage is supposed to smell like anise when crushed.
It is a bright chartreuse yellow leaved cultivar that remains evergreen, so it makes a lovely cheerful sight in the winter garden.
In full sun (with moisture) it will be yellower and fuller, and in shade looser and darker green.
Debs Garden has a nice profile of this plant.
The problem is that it is not hardy here. It is a southern plant, really zone 7, and the only way it works for me is in a pot.
So I have it in a container, and it is on the porch, protected. That doesn't fulfill its purpose to brighten the winter garden with lovely broadleaf evergreen foliage.
But I could not resist the allure of anise scent. "Illicium" means allurement in Latin -- really!
It wants moist shade. The best I can do is put the pot out in summer under the maple tree in Meadow's Edge, where in summertime it can brighten the dark recesses of that garden.
It can grow to 10 feet or more, it grows upright and conical with little pruning. It will form a suckering colony, but in a container that won't happen, and the size will be much less. But I am hoping I get a big, full, leafy plant.
Note
This is not star anise (Illicium verum), so it's not culinary. And it is not the stinky-flowered anise shrub (Illicium floridanum), which smells awful when blooming.
