Why white hydrangeas rule

I’ve had white hydrangeas on the brain lately. They’re clean, cool and strikingly simple. And, when it comes to flower arranging, they’re mighty efficient.

I like to take just one branch, snip off the leaves, pop it in a tall square vase and put it on my nightstand or bathroom sink. (Naturally, that’s always the exact moment at which my cat springs up and tries to start chomping.)

For a bigger space, I use a larger vase and add a few more branches, leaving the leaves on. If I’m having people over, I might add a few seashells or small stones to the bottom of the vase.

I love the way hydrangeas’ cloverlike petals – floppy and fluffy, yet elegant and dramatic – tumble softly over the edge of the vase. I love that this “white” flower is often a mixture of cream and pale pink, dappled with green or streaked with light blue.

And I prefer hydrangeas’ subtle fragrance to strongly scented white flowers like freesia or gardenia.

The name hydrangea comes from the Greek and, roughly translated, means “water barrel." That's because hydrangeas are thirsty blooms and their petals resemble little cups.

Hydrangeas look stunning at events, too. I worked with Victoria at Rossi & Rovetti Flowers, a top San Francisco florist, rossirovetti.com, to provide flowers for last weekend’s Blogher.com conference of about 1,000 mostly women bloggers.

I chose two big bouquets of white hydrangeas and one bouquet of white calla lilies, surrounded by white hydrangeas. It looked terrific!

Give them a try sometime this summer and let me know what you think.

Flower Fact of the Day: What went wrong with Denver’s plan to grow a new variety of daisy (named in honor of the city) in time for the Democratic National Convention demconvention.com next month? Read the New York Times report at: nytimes.com/2008/07/19/us/19daisies.html?ref=us.

Jacqueline - Editor

July 22, 2008

floral trends
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Comments (2)

Comments

scarlett

Very cool idea for summer decors! I live in the 'burbs and was wondering what to do with all the hydrangea.

Christie

I have a Weeping Hydrangea and its blooms are white. After they start to fade, I dry the whole flower intact. Then I spray them gold or whatever color I choose and use them in a dried flower arrangement. You do have to handle them carefully since those dried petals really want to shed, but I have some arrangements over ten years old.

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