Top Five Stylish Halloween Flowers

Top Five Stylish Halloween Flowers

autumn Autumn Colors burgundy Cotinus fall Halloween Hypericum orange art tango lilies Rosehips Sunflowers z-callas zantedeschia

I love Halloween.  Not only is it full of mischief and fun, it has a style all its own.  As one of the first "events" of the 2016 fall season, Halloween is full of changing color, mystery, and delight.  Today, we're talking flowers with a focus on FIVE of the best seasonal blooms for all your spooky arrangements.

Orange Art Tango Lily

Orange Art Tango Lily bouquet featured in Flowers& Magazine

1. Orange Art Tango Lily

One of my favorite fall flowers is the unique Orange Art Tango Lily, a wonderfully bold Latvian Asiatic hybrid featuring saturated orange petals with thick brushstrokes of dark burgundy in the throat. It's a stunning flower by itself, and its dramatic color scheme can work in all styles of autumn-themed bouquets.

2. Sunflowers

The best Halloween colors are warm, saturated, and full of contrast. Sunflowers, of course, are solidly autumn. Their fiery yellow, red, and orange petals paired with giant black, green, and taupe eyes provide a distinctive textural juxtaposition. They're gorgeous, fun, singular, and perfect for Halloween.

3. Celosia

Other things to look for in Halloween flowers are texture, unusual shapes, and vibrancy. A perfect example is our line of Bombay Celosia, which comes in electric hues of orange, red, hot pink, yellow, and lime green. Their brain-like appearance is perfect for Halloween decor, but they can also lend an  elegant, inspired feel.  According to AIFD designer Walter Fedyshyn, its "velvety texture makes any arrangement look like a work of art."

Bombay Celosia

 4. Fall Berries: Rosehips & Hypericum

Continuing on the theme of texture, some excellent autumn berries which provide pops of colors and depth are rosehips and hypericum.   These focal points are tried-and-true fall favorites and come in a variety of colors to add just the seasonal touch you need.

Sunflowers with Pumpkin Hypericum and Red Rosehips (L-R)

5. Dark Purple Accents

Dark purple hues, such as burgundy and maroon, resonate with the naturally changing autumnal ambiance.  A great example is royal purple cotinus, whose dark, earthy leaves have a bright red, iridescent edging--it provides a great backdrop to warmer autumnal shades.   

Royal Purple Cotinus paired with Royal Sunset Lilies

Zantedeschia, or z-callas, also offer a great range of dark maroon and burgundy blooms.  They have an incredible vase life, look stunning on their own and also when paired with other autumn favorites such as brassica and bells of Ireland.

Burgundy Zantedeschia, on its own and paired with Bells of Ireland and Crane Red Brassica

Sun Valley's division of hand-crafted bouquet design, Sun Pacific Bouquet (aka Sun Pac), is answering the call of autumn with the use of some of these fall favorites.  Their 2016 Fall Bouquet Collection features flowers such as warm-hued lilies and sunflowers, backed by seasonal greens and burgundy hypericum and cotinus.

Wild Fall Bouquet and Black Spider Bouquet by SunPac

When creating your fall arrangements this year try your hand with some of these five autumnal elements; and of course, do not forget the best part of Halloween bouquets--spooky fun.

American-grown Hypericum

American-grown Hypericum

#americangrown #CAGrown fall arrangements Fall Flowers Hypericum hypericum berries Lady Aster

Sun Valley is growing the versatile and oft-used botanical, Hypericum. Before my humble beginnings here on the farm, I had never heard of this plant, much less seen it out and about.  But now that I've grown wise to the ways of the flower, I see the unique berries of this plant EVERYWHERE.

"Midnight Glow" hypericum growing in the field

This ornamental superstar features colorful berries on a compact shrub.  The plant itself is a perennial botanical, sprouting golden blooms in the spring, which fall off to reveal elliptical berries come late summer.  We plant hypericum outdoors in fields of dark, rich soil, and let the long, warm days of summer coax it to maturity.  In Arcata,  it is very much a seasonal crop--we harvest the stems at the end of summer and fall, pruning while we pick, allowing the plant to rest and re-gather nutrients for the following season.

However, at our Oxnard location, we harvest hypericum throughout the year.  The Southern California climate, with its consistently longer and warmer days, creates the ideal growing conditions for year-round hypericum cultivation.   

Butter-yellow hypericum flowers and their resulting berries

The "classic hypericum" look has always been a leafy branch with dark-hued berries.  Now, after years of breeding, it's available in many other colors ranging from pale green to dark red.  We currently offer several of these colors, such as deep crimson Midnight Glow, mahogany-hued Universe, luminous Pumpkin, bright Lemon, and the magical red Triumph.

Some of our hypericum varieties, clockwise from upper left: Lemon, Triumph, Midnight Glow, and Pumpkin

Hypericum berries are long-lasting, retaining their color for weeks, which make them ideal additions to a wide range of floral arrangements.  And, as you can see in the photos,  the plant has multiple berries per stem, which makes it a great accent botanical as well as a bright focal piece in your autumn decorating palette.  The smooth and shiny berries provide an interesting and modern textural contrast, which has shown to be highly desirable.

Here, hypericum berries are mixed with sunflowers to create an iconic fall bouquet.

And here, another beautiful use of hypericum mixed with "flame" Calla Lilies

More and more designers are finding that it adds a festive and lively feeling for any occasion and plenty of opportunities for creative exploration.  Take a look at the beautiful and innovative ideas our friends with Flowersand have cooked up below:

Above, peach-colored hypericum berries are strung together to create a whimsical and elegant addition to bridal bouquets and a centerpiece.  Below, red hypericum berries are kept bunched and added to warm floral hues (images found in the September 2015 issue of Flowersand).

The majority of hypericum is grown abroad in South America and Africa, leaving us as one of the few producers on United States soil.  With its growing popularity, we are proud to be one of the largest providers of American-Grown Hypericum, (especially since it's looking so gorgeous)!

Summer Flower Fields on the Farm

Summer Flower Fields on the Farm

bikes Hypericum Iris Lucifer Crocosmia summer flower farming

So much of the detail work of flower farming is tied to time spent sitting at a computer. Today, I decided to brake free of the routine, and take an early morning bike ride around our Arcata farm.

I grabbed the rickety Schwinn farm cruiser, and pedaled off with my camera to see what was happening in the fields.  Some days its easy to forget why you got into the flower business.  Riding across the farm, looking for patches of color across the landscape is a great reminder about the beauty of flower farming.

The clouds were still hanging pretty low, but the soft light of a brisk summer morning made the flowers stand out.

I passed a field of iris, with a few yellow blooms flashing like a golden flare.

Golden Beauty Iris

Next, I came to the peace of a fallow field. We are lucky to be able to leave much of our land to regenerate nutrients. The grasses are green from the thick fog that keeps our area moist to the touch, hoping off my bike, my shoes and pant legs got wet as I looked around.

Farm Cruising!

Riding across the field, I saw a sea of red on the horizon. I knew it was our crocosmia crop dancing in the gentle breeze. I bounced across the field to a dirt road that led me to a wonderful sight.

Lucifer Crocosmia

The Lucifer variety in bloom is truly a site to behold.

Wowza!

You can point your camera in any direction and find inspiration. Even looking away from the flowers... where I found a fresh raccoon track. I think they must share my love of these flowers.

Raccoon tracks on the farm

Back in the saddle, I wandered up to something which is truly news worthy. Sun Valley is growing old fashion, California spray hypericum. We will be reporting more on this story, but this classic is coming back, and we are leading the charge to bring this CAGrown botanical, back to United States production. It's looking gorgeous!

#AmericanGrown Hypericum

  This is the epitome of summer flower farming.

Flower farming at its finest.

I continued on, pedaling west across the farm, in the distance you could see the sand dunes that hold back the pounding, pacific waves. I scared up a few quail, ...they were too quick for a picture and the scare was mutual.  I got to a quiet spot and turned my lens south towards Humboldt Bay. The sun was starting to come through the clouds, the road south laid out before me, beckoning me to ride a little further.

Don't forget the magic of flowers, don't forget that they come from the the same land we walk on everyday, don't forget that out in the valleys and coastal lowlands of California all sorts of people  have been drawn to the art and science growing flowers simply for people to enjoy.

Cheers to more days like this.

Emerald With Envy, Pantone 17-5641

Emerald With Envy, Pantone 17-5641

Bells of Ireland Christmas greens Corgy White Emerald Green Ball Dianthus Hypericum J Schwanke Pantone 17-5641 Parrot Tulips Rodi Groot Sun Pacific Bouquet.

Now that you have had about a week to ponder Pantone 17-5641, let’s talk FLOWERS! You’ve seen the runway models in gorgeous emerald dresses; the wild emerald jewelry that is back in vogue and anyone on Pintrest has seen a huge emerald wave crash over cyberspace. Some of these emerald fans are getting a bit carried away, but if you can’t get carried away in the fashion industry, then where can you?

Pantone 17-5641 grips the world! Shoelaces, a python, and the Emerld City...where the Wizard lives. 



Luckily at Sun Valley we don’t need to look too far to find amazing emerald hues. In our botanical category some of our most popular items are emerald. Green Ball is an ever popular style of dianthus. Adding volume and beautiful texture to any arrangement, Green Ball will be the bell of the ball this season. Speaking of bells, how about Bells of Ireland? Ireland is known as the Emerald Isle, and our Bells of Ireland are about as close to Pantone 17-5641 as you can get. Its scientific name is Moluccella laevis and it’s a member of the mint family. In the language of flowers, it means “luck” and since we are growing this crop down in Baja, you are in luck that you can order it today, even when it is dark and stormy back in the old country.



Green Ball, Bells of Ireland, Corgy White Brassica



Ornamental kale, otherwise known as Brassica, is a really unique design element either playing a leading role as a focal in bouquets, or adding girth and substance to accent lilies and iris. We grow several varieties of brassica throughout the year, but currently we are harvesting a variety named Corgy White. This variety has rich green leaves on the outside and reaches a white center. On the journey beautiful emerald tones highlight this unusual botanical.

Rodi Groot the lead bouquet designer for our Sun Pacific Bouquet division in Oxnard says, “ In bouquet design I like using green flowers like viburnum, green ball, bells of Ireland and green hypericum to name a few. They bring calm to the bouquet and at the same help the other colors pop!”



A beautiful emerald design from Rodi Groot in our Sun Pacific Bouquet department. 



Hypericum is seriously in demand this time of year. Its shiny berries make it a favorite of floral designers. We have brought in a large shipment of hypericum from our partners in Ecuador. The “Selvia Romance” boasts heaps of emerald green berries; perhaps the runway models should be carrying a bouquet of this stand out…although it might outshine the Divas.

Selvia Romance Hypericum

And when it comes to Divas, anyone who follows this blog will be thrilled to know the Queen of Greens is ecstatic about the new Pantone. Our West Coast Evergreen Division is full of green foliage in a variety of shades, whether specialty branches, Christmas greens, seasonal greens or western greens.

Sun Valley is known first and foremost for our year round tulips, and guess what? We have Pantone 17-5641 in a tulip. Check out our Super Parrot. Yup, that’s the real deal; the white edges provide a great contrast to the green petals. Ooh la la.

Sun Valley's Super Parrot Tulip.

We sent a note over to J Schwanke, The Flower Expert and Host of FUN with Flowers and J, www.ubloom.com, and asked him his opinion on Pantone 17-5641. He had some very insightful comments, not just discussing using green elements, but really explaining what this color as a fashion trend is going to look like.

Here are some words of advice from J:

It's about using the COLOR of the year to our "FLOWER'S" Advantage... and this year's Pantone Color provides a PICTURE PERFECT Background... for so many flowers... it's not limited to Flowers that may grow in its specific tint, tone or shade...

The whole Flower World looks FABULOUS With Green... "Emerald" Envy... I dare say.

With Juxtaposition... I think Emerald - Pantone's Color of the Year for 2013... is a dramatic background color that allows us the opportunities BEYOND "Matching the color"... (Although Amazing Textural Products like Bells of Ireland, Green Ball Dianthus, or Corgy White Brassica... will indeed allow us to address the color of the year with TEXTURE too!!!)

2013's "Emerald" provides the perfect "Backdrop" ... to showcase our Creativity and the Diverse Colors of our Flower Palette. What will you do with Pantone's Color of the Year??? Your Creativity is the only Limitation!"

J continued on with some fun examples of how he might interpret emerald: LOVE THESE IDEAS!

Imagine the Complimentary "Explosion" of featuring Acapulco Lilies... on an Emerald Green Bridesmaid Dress...or a Christmas Departure... using ILEX Branches in a Clear Vase atop an "EMERALD" Christmas Table Cloth...

Experience the Friendly "Laughter" caused by an exquisite fragrant bouquet of Sun Rise Freesia and Aventura Gerbera placed on a dining or cocktail table... set with Glistening "EMERALD" glassware or Napkins...

Visit a Magical "Mineral Color Based" Flower Spa... as you soak in the Cool Colors of Kuhnert Blue Hydrangea, Delphinium, and Atlantic Hyacinth... against an "Emerald" Background of a sofa or throw pillows positioned in an ocean side cabana...

Thank you for sharing J, I hope you invite me next time you head to the “Flower Spa”…I wanna go!