I am writing this blog to help ANYONE having a difficult time trying to force fresh cut Peonies to open.
I love Peonies! Who doesn’t? I have never had too much trouble with them. I once had crummy ones a few Decembers ago, but I passed them off as a random, off season duds. So I thought nothing of working with them for my spring wedding this past weekend. I have never had a problem with in season Peonies. It seemed simple enough, Roses, Spray Roses, Ranuculas, and Peonies. Piece of cake, right? WRONG.
These Peonies were “bullet tight,” as florists call them. Rock solid, not going to budge, tight as could be. So I began my normal regimen of coaxing tighter bloomed ones to open. Place in hot water with the proper floral solution, place on sunny windowsill. This did nothing. So an hour or two later, I recut them shorter, placed back in fresh hot water, misted them with water, wrapped the bucket and all buds in clear plastic, and placed them back on the windowsill. I went home shortly after doing this, expecting there to be significant progress by morning. Well when I returned, only one had opened, and it was still only about 50%.
It was time for the dunking technique. I took each bud and dunked it into hot water, and shook it up and down, hoping to loosen the outer petals from the force of the water. I left them upside down for about 5 minutes. I re-cut them, placed into more fresh hot water, recovered them, and again, placed on the windowsill. I repeated this technique every few hours. I also plugged in a space heater, but kept it a safe distance, for fear that I might scorch the little buds.
When this technique STILL wasn’t working the night before the wedding I got my space heater, the brightest desk lamp I had, and repeated the same dunk, mist, cover technique but created a little heating area for them, surrounded by tall buckets and plastic. Well I was finally able to tease them open at this point. It was a VERY late night.
A few of them still weren’t open by the morning, so I cut them super short and used them in centerpieces, rather than put them into the bouquets. Fortunately by the time we were pulling the van into the venue driveway, almost every one of the buds finally “popped”. But not without a TON of help.
So the next time you question whether or not you should hire a professional to create your wedding florals, consider this story. And if you are one of the professionals who is stuck in this situation, know you are not alone! I think we have all been in this kind of situation at one time or another. I would love to hear similar stories if you have one to share!
~Heather
P.S. If you were one of my brides trying to contact me this week and I was slow to respond, this is why. And I assure all of you the same care and attention will be given to your florals should any blooms not cooperate as they should 🙂 Thanks so much for bearing with me, and your patience everyone!!!
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