This has certainly been a week of tulips, both in and out of the house!
Last week’s vases of Apricot Impression, Orange Nassau and Chato all lasted until yesterday and during the week I have added a few other displays. The beds and containers around the house are now also bulging with tulips and the Cutting Garden is getting more colourful as each day goes by. I have wildly overestimated the rate at which I can use all these tulips, but at least I know I have enough to go round and it is lovely to have such colour in the Cutting Garden.
I mentioned earlier in the week that I have planted out the sweet peas started in the greenhouse in winter. With them I planted borage and dill plugs and my little borage plants are the first casualty of the year – they have disappeared and I suspect the many rooks I can see hanging around the Cutting Garden have taken them. I always have to be very careful with vegetable plugs, but flowers have not previously been a problem. At least it is not too late in the year to start again.
You can see above the cutting bed in which I intend to plant predominantly white and green flowers. This bed was weeded and raked over during the week, so is now ready for a mix of plugs and direct sowings. It will be from here that I will be picking ammi majus, orlya, cosmos, snapdragons and dahlias, all in shades of white, later in the season. For now the white tulips are having their day – although I love all tulips I think the elegant whites are my favourite.
I showed this photo earlier in the week, but as Jan Reus is featuring today I thought another look at her growing outside was a good idea.
Jan Reus is a member of a category of tulips called Triumph. Triumph tulips are known for their sturdy stems and long flowering time. They are quite early flowerers and also repeat very well. I have not grown Jan Reus in the garden before, but a Triumph tulip that I do grow is Purple Prince and that is still looking stunning in its fourth spring.
Jan Reus is a dark velvet red. Sarah Raven’s description as a ‘deep, dark and luscious crimson’ is perfect. Another feature of Triumph tulips is that they have a long vase life, so I am expecting this arrangement to easily last the week. It is worth mentioning here that cut tulips placed on sunny windowsills do not last as long as tulips kept in cooler shadier positions. In the sun tulips open out to attract pollinators and this weakens the tight flower shape.
Jan Reus has replaced last week’s vase of Chato on the mantle in the drawing room. The colour works very well, so I will be cutting a few more tomorrow for the coffee table – more is always better with tulips!
My second tulip this week is the lily flowered Tres Chic.
I have to admit to being slightly disappointed with this one when it first flowered late last week. This is billed as a late flowering pure white tulip. All the tulips are early this year, but my other lates are only just showing colour, so Tres Chic was very early. Also I would say the colour is a creamy white, rather than a pure white and it has flowered on quite a short stem. That said when I got it inside this morning and arranged a group of 20 stems in this large blue flowered jug I was very pleased with the result.
When preparing tulips for the vase, as with any flower, it is best to remove any foliage that will be below the water level of the vase. Sometimes I strip the tulips completely to reveal the long straight stem. On other occasions, such as in the jug above, I leave a layer of leaves to pad out the stems so making sure the arrangement stands upright.
The Lily flowered varieties are my favourite of all the tulips. They hold their elegant shape well in the garden and are good repeat flowerers. As well as Tres Chic I also grow White Triumphator, which is a pure white lily shape on a long stem. As White Triumphator has not flowered yet, I think I will keep Tres Chic in next years Cutting Garden list despite my reservations, as it will ensure that I have my favourite white lily shape for a longer period.
In the garden I grow White Triumphator in a shady bed with the frilly white tulip Swan Wings and the parrot tulip White Parrot. All flower together late in the season and look very tranquil growing amongst Dicentra alba with white foxgloves and the tall white allium Mount Everest shooting up to take over the flowering reins. I have no luck with White Parrot or Swan Wings repeating, so this is a trio I now replant every autumn.
I hope that you have had a lovely weekend and that you will join me here again tomorrow for ‘In A Vase On Monday’ when I will be sharing some other spring flowers from my garden.
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I have grown Tres chic for the first time this year and I was disappointed by the short stem, they are not in proportion to the very large pot I have put them in but I love the lily shape. I am really enjoying your reviews of the tulips you grow and the longer glimpse of your cutting garden is absolutely gorgeous.
Thank you Julie – do you think you would grow Tres Chic again? I think I would have been very disappointed if I had put them in a large pot – it probably says in the small print that these are short stemmed tulips, but as soon as I see Lily Flowered on a description I imagine a very tall elegant tulip. Having said that, once cut and in a vase I am pleased with them.
Yes I would but I will choose a more creative pot. It feels very luxurious to cut them for indoors, hopefully I will learn to embrace this!
It’s a pleasure to peek at your cutting garden Julie. The tulips you featured today are lovely in their containers.
Thank you Susie.
Julie,
I had always wondered how your garden might look .since I have never seen the actual uk I was never able to place a proper picture of what you wrote. But today it was nice seeing your garden. Your tulips are out of the world especially when you bought it indoors. There was no need for another accessories for the arrangement. I enjoyed reading it..
And I never knew camellias can grow into trees ,as shown in Gardners World. I liked eposide 6 very much.Did you watch this week?
Thank you Sajina. I did watch Gardeners World and really enjoyed the episode. I saw a huge camellia in flower at a garden I visited a week ago – I am hoping to write a post about the garden soon and will include a picture. The garden filled with camellias that Carol visited was beautiful – it is hard to grow camellias like that in the part of the UK where I live. I also loved the auricula’s – my father had a small collection and one day I would like to start my own.
I agree with the others that it was lovely to see a longer view of the cuttings garden, you have such a large space and you are making excellent use of it. As I’ve said before my tulips often open on short stems and then grow, I don’t remember them ever doing that in the UK, which is, of course, hopeless for cut flowers. Love Jan Reus, it has a wonderful depth of colour. Do your bulbs split to produce more flowers from one bulb? Mine do.
Thank you Christina – I will try to include more full views as the season moves on. I am looking forward to seeing what grows well in your Cutting Garden. I do have a problem with tulip bulbs splitting – particularly if they are not planted deeply. The little bulbs never flower and the main bulb is useless here after it has split.
The view of your cutting garden is beautiful, which gives me an idea. My veggies are geown in raised beds because of heavy clay in the garden, maybe that is where I should plant my tulips in future!
That sounds like a good plan. As long as the tulips can be cleared before you need the space for the vegetables they should do well in a raised bed.
Will all your cutting beds be colour themed Julie? I was intersted to read you had planted out some sweet peas – I must have missed that post. I planted out my autumn sown ones on Sunday but wasn’t sure if it was too early but they were really ready to get going properly. We had a frost last night although I had covered them so I trust they are OK. So many tulips to choose from – I will have to be really restrained when I put my order in as I haven’t nearly as much space as you have! 🙂
My four large beds are loosely colour themed Cathy – white & cool green, pink & lilac, dark reds & purple, orange, yellow & acid green. I am not overly strict about this though – often things go where there is a space! I only planted out the sweet peas earlier this week so you are not behind. They are hardy annuals so should survive a frost as long as they have been hardened off.
Thanks for that reassurance re the sweet peas, Julie – and I am sure they have put on more growth even in the few days they have been outside.
Such a delight to see your well planned cut flower patch! Sorry about the sweet peas but you should be allright still. I always sow mine in spring. What will you do with the bulbs when after flowering?
Thank you Annette – the view of the cutting garden seems very popular! It was actually the borage I have lost – thankfully not the sweet peas which seem to be ok – I think the supports and netting confuses the birds. I throw the bulbs from the cutting garden away – they would not regrow with any success and I need to clear the space for annuals and dahlias. In my main garden I leave the bulbs undisturbed from one year to the next. Quite often they reflower well.
Lovely flowers. Lovely photos. Thank you. I enjoy your blog.