The best time to learn about a flower is when it's in season and everywhere around town.
My florist gave me what resembled six light pink lollipops with leaves, and told me there would be a great surprise in the center when they opened. Cool - I love surprises!
The surprise, a note on choosing and also learning about the basic peony types after the jump...
We're sending a shout-out to all of you who bring home flowers to brighten up your home. Do YOU have some Sat. morning flowers to share? Let me know! You can drop a line with a small description and some pics at matt at apartment therapy dot com
For all Saturday Morning Flowers, click here!
These flower-lollipops opened up first in a lopsided way, with petals stretching out like wings on one side, and then to the other, with the fat ball in the center. The opening resembled a drunk bumblebee in slow motion preparing for flight. And then a few days later the centers opened with a flourish to reveal the surprise - beautiful streaks of crimson red. The florist was unsure of the variety, but Paeonia 'Festiva Maxima' is what I think these are, or very close to it.
The best way to buy peonies is when the buds are still tight, like a golf-ball or a big lollipop. What looks like an insignificant bundle will turn into a full vase of flowers.
The many varieties fall within five basic forms. Paeonia.com has a great article outlining them: single, double, semi-double, Japanese, and anemone/bomb-style blossoms. Doubles and anemone styles are very popular at the delis and florists because of their fullness, but Japanese styles, if you can find them at the florist, are especially stunning.
The best place to get them at the best price has to be James Durr on Saturdays at the Union Square Greenmarket. They have had them for the past few weeks, beautiful deep ruby red anemone style peonies and may still have them for a while yet. Get there early and get them fresh.
Two online resources if you are new to the varieties of peonies:
- White Flower Farm has gorgeous pictures of their tree and herbacious varieties.
- Cricket Hill is another online vendor in CT that has beautiful varieties, some of which have been on display at the NYBG in the past. They also have a good section on peony growing and care.
matt at apartment therapy dot com
lovely!
view k in ditmas's profile
If you have ant problem in your yard never ever grow peonies! They attract ants. And ants have aphid farms (who they milk and/or use as a trap to catch ladybugs) on peonies. It's adviced to soak the cut peonies in water for several minutes to wash the ants off.
view Nudik's profile
oh, how i love peonies. more peonies, more saturdays!
view kristenatcal's profile
Absolutely adore peonies -- one of my favorite flowers!
view dblitz1's profile
Thank you for posting these (and previous!) peony photos. I'd never seen them anywhere but painitings but now I love them. Just grabbed some from Trader Joe's yesterday and one is opening beautifully! The rest are still tight shut, but I'm enjoying watching them.
view Tiamat_the_Red's profile
Peonies are the flowers of my childhood! My mom planted (and still plants) them along the entire side of our house, and in May we would cut a few to take to our teachers. Happy happy memories of riding the bus to school, clutching a little bouquet of peonies that had been wrapped in wet paper towels and aluminum foil.
view a.meyer's profile
please tell me the camera used for these glorious photos!
(thank you)
view Pemina101's profile
We had friends over for brunch and they brought us a beautiful bouquet just like these. What a treat they will be this week!
view Doug's profile
Pemina101 -
These were taken on a Panasonic DMC-L1. It's not for everyone, but I have grown accustomed to it. It also weighs a ton. The Leica lens is what I have found to be especially enjoyable, I love how it handles the light on the flowers. And I only work with whatever sunlight is available through my windows, no special set-up.
I also enjoy my Leica D-Lux2 (Panasonic makes their own version, and it's much cheaper), which is a compact point-shoot.
I think any camera can take great pictures with enough practice and observation!
view mattplantguy's profile
Our doubles are just beginning to open, which would be magical except for the ants and wasps. I did a brief count of our original 3 plants (looks more like 5 now, but can't be sure, do they multiply?!) and it looked like about 4-5 buds per stalk, numerous stalks, which gives us about 120-150 flowers. It looks more like a pink peony shrub more than anything else.
And yes, we do have an ant problem, several kinds!!
view That70sHeidi's profile