The Simplest Way To Arrange Flowers!

 We just celebrated my 90 year old mother in law's birthday! While I love decorating for a party as much as the next person, my mother in law demanded we keep things simple. So simple I did!  There are secrets to keeping things simple, yet making a statement and making a birthday special.  Our family is really casual and prefers the breakfast room over the dining room for intimate family gatherings.  I rarely use crystal and china, but love fresh flowers and consider them a must on my table every day of the week, but most especially for birthdays and special occasions. One way to make a statement, but not spend lots of money or

time on a centerpiece is to have a tulipiere in your decorating arsenal. I have a Juliska Country Estate tulipiere that I adore!  Lucky me, mine was a gift from a client!  My client knew I had been wanting one for a long time so she surprised me with it one Christmas!  If you aren't familiar with a tulipiere.  They were originally created to house tulip bulbs in 17th century homes.  The bulbs were considered rare and exotic so anyone who had these growing in their homes was consider elite.  The taller the tulipiere the more prestigious. Some of the older ones are as tall as a person. A tulipiere can make a statement when used on a sideboard either solo or in pairs or as a centerpiece for a table. I like them because the look feeds my need to have something from the past, that can be made to look current by choice of flowers and colors. Do you have a tulipiere?  If you don't have a tulipiere what are you waiting for?  You must get one! You can create attractive table arrangements with a tulipiere with little or no effort at all.  The tulipiere does all the design work for you.  

All you need to know are a few basic tips.  

1. Since a tulipiere was originally designed for tulip bulbs and not cut flowers,it's a little tricky to use for cut flowers.  You must be careful not to cut the stem of the flowers too short or it can't reach water. The tulipiere is designed with holes around the sides, so you can only fill the vase up to the height of the side holes, otherwise the water will run out of the sides, so as you move up filling the holes with flowers, you must have longer stems, so they can reach the water or put the stems in water tubes, but not all tulipieres can accommodate water tubes.  ( I find a simple solution is to use a small medicine cup like the one that comes with cough syrup,etc, fill it with water and tuck in the top of the top vase & put the flowers in it, for the top flowers. This doesn't hold much water so you must replenish daily)

2. Make sure to remove greenery off the stem that will be in the water (to reduce loss of water from transpiration & also to prevent rot. try to leave a pair of leaves near the bloom)

3. Use the removed greenery to tuck in behind the flowers on each level.

4.  You may use a variety of flowers or stick with one kind.  Either way, greenery adds a nice free form look.

5. All greenery provides a beautiful look as well, but if you use greenery make sure you have at least three varieties.

6. You don't have to use all the pieces of the tulipiere.  Just use what you need for your table. (See picture below)

7. When using cut flowers, a tulipiere the size of mine uses about four bunches of flowers.  In the arrangement above I used two bunches of sweetheart roses, 1 bunch of regular size roses, 1 bunch of leatrice, then i used the greenery from the flowers to tuck around to fill in the holes.

(I even had enough left over to fill the little milk glass pitchers I found at Tuesday morning. for each place setting.)

Voila, your centerpiece is created!

I rounded up six tulipieres from online sources so you could see the various types available.  Now you have no excuses not to order one!

Photo credit via

Juliska Country Estate $595

Mottahedeh $900

Abigail's Tulipiere $36.30

  

Areo Home Petit Tulipere $20

Martha Grover $700

White Tulipiere, Amazon $21.95

What are you doing to make life more lovely?