My experience with Hakone is limited, but they do seem to be very very slow growers at first. I have 4 in the ground; 2 'Aureola' and 2 plain green, since 2008. The were very slow to establish, but just started popping last year, and look like they'll be double the size again this year.

Last summer I planted three 'Beni-Kaze' and while all three have come back this year, they are no larger than they were when I planted them (3" pots).

I have potted copies of 'All Gold,' 'Fubuki,' 'Naomi' and 'Nicolas' waiting to either be potted on or installed in nursery beds. Of all of them, the 'All Gold' are the largest, 4" pots but several inches tall and very robust.

I imagine a category of plants like this, which is growing in number rapidly, with cross-breeding and tissue culture, will have lots of winners and losers. It reminds me a little of the early days of Hosta. Many new introductions succeeded and many failed miserably.

When I say barely growing I mean two or three leaves. IF they were still as nice as when I planted them, I'd be thrilled.

In my experience, 'All Gold' is the most vigorous. Mine is going on four years from a 4" pot and is about 18" in diameter now just coming up with the leaves not fully extended yet. It will likely have a 24" diameter when they are all the way grown.

'Beni Kaze' and 'Aureola' already look like gallon sized plants.

'All Gold' today:

That 'All Gold' is brilliant!

It is , I just love it.

I bought about 10 hakonechloa Nicolas to border a shady bed last year and none of them turned red, not even pale orange or yellow. They all stayed just the medium green they started out as. Has anyone else experienced this? Is it a factor of the age of the plant? I do have one 2 year old plant of the same variety in the same bed which also stayed green. I am thinking of asking for a refund or exchange as they did not perform as expected with the appropriate siting.

Mine get a little color, but I don't think my autumns are cool enough to really get them going. They are also young (2-3 years), so we'll see how they do when they age.

I have no idea why that photo link is broken, I didn't move the photo.

Anyway, NONE of mine that are supposed to turn red in fall ever have done much....However, I haven't had them very long.