Medicinal Herbs

Honeysuckle Flower Extract

Lonicera japonica

Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) is a climbing vine whose stems run to ten metres or more, downy and pale green when young, smooth and reddish-brown with age, and whose paired oval leaves stay green through the winter. From May to August the flowers open in pairs in the leaf axils, long two-lipped tubes, white at first and turning yellow after a while, so that silver and gold hang on the plant together, which gives it its Vietnamese name. They are sweetly scented. It grows wild in the northern mountain provinces and is now planted as well; the flowers are picked as they open, still white, and dried.