Scabiosa is an airy, graceful annual that produces beautiful cut flowers in the pink and purple family. Black Knight, pictured here, is a purple-black color with pink pins, although I’d really like to grow what may be an even darker English cultivar, Ace of Spades. The botanical name arises from the fact that the flowers were steeped to produce a “tea” used to bathe people with scabies (infestation with mites). It is widespread in Northern Europe and was brought to America by early settlers who carried it further westward (when people owned one outfit).