Hydrangeas

A hydrangea drinks through its face

Most cut flowers take water only through the cut stem. Hydrangea also absorbs it through the petals, which are really sepals and unusually thick. That single fact explains almost everything else about handling one.

It explains why a hydrangea that has gone limp is usually not finished. Recut the stem under running water, then submerge the whole head in a sink of cool water for twenty or thirty minutes and stand it back up. More often than not it comes back firm. Nothing else in the cooler responds to that.

It also explains why hydrangea minds dry heat far more than it minds age. A vase on a mantelpiece above a working fire, or a bouquet left in a car on a warm afternoon, is losing water from the entire surface of the head at once. Keep it out of direct sun and away from moving air, and mist the head when the room is dry.

What we will not print

We will not give you a hydrangea season. No verified California grower calendar stands behind one, and what reaches the Los Angeles market arrives through importers in every month. Writing "in season now" above a flower that is flown in during December is the thing that makes the rest of a florist’s advice worthless. Hydrangea is available all year. That is the honest version of the sentence. The flowers that do have a real local season are listed in what is in season in Los Angeles.

What it is actually for

One hydrangea head does the visual work of a dozen small flowers, so it fills a room quickly and fills a vase at a much lower stem count than roses would. That makes it the right call for an entrance table, a reception desk, any large surface that reads as empty. It is a poor traveller: heavy, easily bruised, and the first thing to sulk in a hot car.

This collection is deliberately short. In our hands hydrangea is usually a component rather than a solo act, and it does its best work beside ranunculus and stock. For the fuller mixed arrangements it appears in, start with bouquets or with the larger pieces in $190 to $290.