In her article for the Charlotte Observer “Bouquet Picked from a Garden on a Bleak December Morning”, published December 18, 1966, Elizabeth Lawrence wrote, “On the fourth of December, after a night when the temperature dropped to 20, and on a day when it did not rise above 35, I went out to pick a bouquet for Mrs. Stuart Gaul who was in the hospital.”
Elizabeth lists everything in bloom that she picked: one Algerian iris (Iris unguicularis); a sprig of the strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo); a twig of fragrant viburnum (Viburnum x bodnantense); a spray of winter clematis (Clematis cirrhosa); rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus); “one flower out on the first stalk of paper white narcissus” (Narcissus papyraceus); violas (‘Blue Perfection’); Camellia x vernalis ‘Dawn’ “(slightly discolored)”; “one frozen rose bud of the old pink climbing daily” (Rosa ‘Climbing Pink Daily’); yellow chrysanthemums (Chrysanthemum “Ridgewood Yellow”); two different asters; “and a snip of Erica carnea—but that was cheating for it was not quite out”. She goes one to say that the hardy cyclamen blooms were gone, but she “picked a beautiful silver patterned leaf”, and that it was “an interval without white hoopskirt daffodils”.
Today is the 4th of December, 55 years later, after a night when the temperature dropped to balmy 47, and on a day when it did not rise above a near record high of 74. I walked around Elizabeth’s garden to see what bouquet I might create, and was pleased to find a few familiar faces, although not everyone was available and ready to be picked. The Algerian iris (a division of Elizabeth’s original, reinstated to the garden in 2016) does not have a flower open today or even a bud that is close to unfurling, but it has flowered already, and has more buds packed tightly down in the foliage. I need to plant a new fragrant viburnum, and the winter clematis that now climbs the arch over the garden gate will open its ivory buds in a couple of weeks. (It is not the same type but it does bloom in winter.) Elizabeth’s paper white narcissus are not yet blooming, but there are buds coming. The asters in the garden have finished blooming; they are not the same as those she had 55 years ago—one of which Elizabeth Clarkson brought from her mother’s garden in Uvalde, Texas, that bloomed very late. Oh, how I would love to restore it to this garden… and to Elizabeth Clarkson’s! I finally tired of the seemingly constant spider mite infestation on the rosemary I planted several years ago, so I shovel-pruned it last year and have not planted a new one… yet. I could have snipped a sprig from the very same Erica carnea, but, even 55 years later, it would still have been cheating as it is not quite out.
Here is what I picked: one (non-frozen) rose bud each from ‘Louis Philippe’, ‘Cecile Brunner’ and ‘Madame Joseph Schwartz’; a sprig of strawberry tree; one of the last flowers of Argentinian sage (Salvia guaranitica); violas (‘Blue Penny’); Camellia x vernalis ‘Dawn’ (from the exact same plant!); yellow chrysanthemum (again, the same plant!); two hardy cyclamen blooms (Cyclamen hederifolium) and one beautiful silver patterned leaf; a sprig of winter sweet (Chimonanthus praecox); a stem of blooms of slender-leaf grape holly (Mahonia confusa ‘Narihira’); two sprigs of sweet alyssum (Lobularia maritima cvs.), and one bloom of a brown or black eyed Susan seedling (Rudbeckia sp.) that I transplanted from Elizabeth’s sister’s garden in late summer.
I carefully arranged all of these beautiful little blooms in one of Elizabeth’s very own little glass vases—generously on permanent loan from Warren & Fran Way, her nephew and his wife. I am more than grateful there is no one I know in the hospital, so I will leave this bouquet of flowers on Elizabeth’s desk in her studio, where she looked out over her garden every day.
Today’s bouquet of flowers… 55 years later
The other side of the bouquet