Welcome to Tara Flowers!  Flowers have some very interesting tales and facts to go along with their beauty which we like to share.

Tara – the Tibetan Goddess – Represents the never-ending desires that fuel all life.  The flower Tara carries is the Lotus, pictured above.

Flowers – Are such a beautiful gift of nature!  Pleasing to the eye, they can brighten, enliven and energize any room – and beautify any landscaping.  Some flowers have the most awesome fragrances which captivate your senses to the utmost – fragrances that are captured in the world’s finest perfumes – And their essences have been turned into some of the best therapeutic remedies.

Flowers have carried a language that has different meanings and connotations all over the world. There is no telling exactly how large the degree of influence they have played upon many artists, writers, or poets. They’re a great friend to us whenever we wish to express our thoughts, feelings, and emotions to one another.

Flowers do have the ability to influence our emotions and affect our moods. Rutgers University has conducted a behavioral research study and has found that they actually trigger happy emotions. They also heighten feelings of life satisfaction and affect social behavior in a positive manner far beyond what is normally perceived. As a result of the study, there is very little debate about the evidence that flowers will increase a person’s happiness, their intimacy, or their moods.

The traditional associations linked to flowers are not as impressive, perhaps, as the scientific healing abilities they seem to have. Dr. Roger Ulrich, an environmental psychologist at Texas A&M University, was the first American to research and study the benefits of plants on hospital patients, found that plants have a strange effect on patients when they are visible.  It was found through the study that in addition to additional optimism and boosted well-being, the patients had less overall stress, experienced shorter stays in the hospital, and had a lower need for pain medications.

A brand of ‘patient friendly’ health care environments have developed from the findings of that study. What has resulted is an increase in flowers in health care places, as an effort to try to heal the patients in the best possible way.

Over time, flowers have gained associated meanings, and are rarely selected randomly. For example, acacia flowers are given to express concealed love, chaste love, or beauty. Furthermore, the Aster is a plant associated with love/daintiness, the pink carnation one that is linked with never forgetting, the yellow carnation with rejection or disappointment, and the tulip linked with seeing sunshine in anothers’ smile.

From the seemingly simple home and office floral arrangements, to the more spectacular wedding affairs, flowers are a pivotal part of our existence. It is also true that some kinds in particular might have a unique place in coronations, rituals, and various celebrations. On Birthdays we wish our dear and near ones with a fresh bouquet. Whether giving or receiving the message of ‘I care for you’, flowers are a great way to express our emotion.

The lotus (nelumbo nucifera) represents beauty, purity, grace, elegance, perfection and non-attachment.  The lotus has often been used in songs and poems and is an allegory for ideal feminine attributes.

The flower of the lotus is said to symbolize the journey and advancement of the soul through the realization of the material world to be one with the supreme soul.

This beautiful flower grows in the muddy waters of still lakes and ponds.  This magnificent blossom will unfold one petal at a time.  When the morning sun’s rays touch the flower, it will awaken and bloom.  This interdependence between the lotus and sun is a symbol of love.

A unique characteristic of the lotus flower is that it will shed its seeds and also bloom at the same time.

The lotus flower has been drawn in many fine Asian paintings where you will find some of the most beautiful artwork based on the lotus blossom.

In Buddhism, you will see in many paintings Buddha will be seated on a lotus flower.  The theory of karma states that just like the lotus flower, our life is made up of cause and effect.  The lotus can produce a beautiful flower even within the dirtiest of waters.  This is symbolism meaning that a person can rise above being rooted in the ugliness and suffering of the world, and you should try to be pure and help others with the beauty of the spirit.

The lotus flower is also used as religious symbolism of ancient Egypt.  It was the lotus and papyrus plant that symbolized the primeval waters of Nun, from which the Egyptians believed life began.

It was said, according to old myths, that ancient Egyptians would sing for the lotus in their parties.  There was a day set aside to be the feast of lotus.  Everyone during this feast was to hold a silver pot which was shaped like a lotus and had a burning candle in the middle.  After that, everybody was to head for the Nile River, still carrying the pot in their hands with an overwhelming dream in their heart.  If the burning candle continued floating on the surface of water, your dream would come true.

The lotus is used for meditation and is said to bring harmony to all aspects of our being, within and without.  With the thousands of years associated in the spiritual practices used with the lotus as a symbol, the lotus is believed to be the foremost flower essence on this planet.

The lotus can aid in the cleansing your entire system of toxins.  It is used in bath therapies, oils and fine creams and lotions.  Lotus essence is used to enhance the effectiveness of Aromatherapy, Homeopathy and Kinesiology, along with being used on acupressure points.

The Rose – a symbol of love – so beautiful.  And to smell a rose, is one of the most pleasing fragrances (from the rose come the saying “you always need to stop and smell the roses”).  The rose is also used for many beneficial herbal remedies.

The rose has a fleshy edible fruit which ripens in late summer through autumn which is called the rose hip.  Rose hips are known for their high vitamin C content, and many supplements are made from pure rosehips.  Rose hips can also be extracted for rose hip seed oil which is what is used in many fine creams and facial products.

Rosewater is widely used in Asian and Middle Eastern cuisine.  Rose syrup comes from France where they extract the rose petals to make the syrup.  Essential oil of rose has been used for centuries in perfumes.

In literature, ancient and modern, sacred and profane, no flower figures so conspicuously as the rose.  To the Romans, it was most significant when placed over the door of a public or private banquet hall.  Each who passed beneath it bound himself thereby not to disclose anything said or done within – hence the expression sub rosa (which means in secret, privately or confidentially), common to this day.

Back in the time of around 551-479 BC, in which Confucious wrote about his life, he claimed that the Emperor of China owned over 600 books about the culture of roses.  The roses grew in the Emperor’s garden, and the Chinese extracted oil from the roses which was used only by nobles and dignitaries of the court.  If ever a commoner was found in possession of even the tiniest amount of rose oil, he would be condemned to death.

During the “War of the Roses”, this is when the rose became an important heraldic symbol.  The House of Lancaster was symbolized by a red rose, and the House of York by a white rose.

To protect its foliage from being eaten by hungry cattle, the rose goes armed into the battle of life with curved, sharp prickles, not true thorns or modified branches, but merely surface appliances which peel off with the bark.

To destroy crawling pilferers of pollen, several species coat their calices, at least, with fine hairs or sticky gum.  And to insure wide distribution of offspring, the seeds are packed in the attractive, bright red calyx tube or hip, a favorite food of many birds, which drop them miles away.

There are over 100 different species of roses with many colors.  There some wild roses which have a different look.  Here a few interesting types:

The smoother, early, or Meadow Rose (R. blanda), found blooming in June and July in moist, rocky places from Newfoundland to New Jersey and a thousand miles westward, has slightly fragrant flowers, at first pink, later pure white.  Their styles are separate, not cohering in a column nor projecting as in the climbing rose – which is a leafy, low bush mostly less than three feet high – it’s either entirely unarmed, or else provided with only a few weak prickles.

In swamps and low, wet ground from Quebec to Florida and westward to the Mississippi, the Swamp Rose (R. Carolina) blooms late in May and on to midsummer.  The bush may grow taller than a man, or perhaps only a foot high.  It is armed with stout, hooked, rather distant prickles, and few or no bristles.

In spite of its American Indian name, the lovely white Cherokee Rose (R. Sinica), that runs wild in the South, climbing, rambling, and rioting with a truly Oriental abandon and luxuriance, did indeed come from China.

Forget Me Nots come from the borage family (Boraginaceae).   They have a beautiful rare blue, pinkish or white flower with yellow eye.  Very abundant here in the U.S. now, they originally came from Europe and Asia.

There are many legends about the forget-me-not.  One is a popular legend which tells how a lover, when trying to gather some of these blossoms for his sweetheart, fell into a deep pool, and threw a bunch on the bank calling out, as he sank forever from her sigh, “Forget Me Not”.

There is a German legend telling the story of when God named all the plants, when a tiny unnamed one cried out, “Forget-me-not, O Lord!”, and God replied “That shall be your name”.

Another dismal myth sends its hero forth seeking hidden treasure caves in a mountain under the guidance of a fairy.  He fills his pockets with gold, but not heeding the fairy’s warning to “forget not the best” (he is crushed by the closing together of the mountain).

There is also a folk-tale from the Persians, as told by their poet Shiraz, “It was in the golden morning of the early world, when an angel sat weeping outside the closed gates of Paradise.  He had fallen from his high estate through loving a daughter of earth, nor was he permitted to enter again until she whom he loved had planted the lowers of the forget-me-not in every corner of the world.  He returned to earth and assisted her, and together they went hand in hand.  When their task was ended, they entered Paradise together, for the fair woman, without tasting the bitterness of death, became immortal like the angel whose love her beauty had won when she sat by the river twining forget-me-nots in her hair”.

It was the golden ring around the forget-me-not’s center that first led to the belief of the conspicuous markings at the entrance of many flowers serving as pathfinders to insects.  This golden circle also shelters the nectar from rain and indicates to the fly or bee just where it must probe between the stigma and anthers to touch them with opposite sides of its tongue.  Since it may probe from any point of the circle, it is quite likely that the side of the tongue that touched a pollen-laden anther in one flower will touch the stigma in the next one visited and then cross-fertilize it.

But forget-me-nots are not wholly dependent on insects.  When these fail, a fully mature flower is still able to set fertile seed by shedding its own pollen directly on the stigma.

Lilies are one of the most beautiful flowers filling a room with an overwhelming sweat fragrant aroma.  A big favorite is the stargazer lily.  However, all lilies are absolutely gorgeous.

There are hundreds of species of the lily family (Liliaceae).  In the New World, Lilies extend from southern Canada through much of the United States.  In the Old World, they extend throughout much of Europe, through Asia to Japan and the Philippines and to the Nilgiri mountains in India.

Legend has it that the creation of the lily was dedicated to the goddess Hera, who was the wife of Zeus.  Zeus fathered Hercules with a mortal woman named Alceme – he then wished his son to partake more fully of divinity.  He then had Hera drugged and brought the baby to her, placed the baby to her breast and Hercules nursed.  Hera was horrified when she awoke and flung the baby from her.  As she flung, the milk gushed across the heavens and formed “the milky way”.  Then a few drops fell to earth, and it was from those drops that sprang the first lilies.

Then there’s the Roman legend that tells of Venus rising from the sea-foam and then seeing a lily.  She becomes filled with jealousy and envy at the beauty and whiteness of it.  She saw the lily as a rival to her own beauty – so she caused a huge and monstrous pistil to spring from the lily’s snow-white center.  This is the myth that accounts for the lily being associated with the Satyrs and Venus who are the personification of lustful ardor.

Lilies are associated with many ancient myths dating all the back to about 1580 BC, which is around the Minoan Period where pictures of lilies were discovered in a villa in Crete.

Historically, opinions differ as to the lily of Scripture.  Eastern peoples use the same word interchangeably for the tulip, anemone, ranunculus, iris, the water-lilies, and those of the field.  The superb scarlet Martagon Lily (L. chalcedonicum), grown in gardens here, is not uncommon wild in places like Palestine.

In the Old Testament and also in the New Testament, lilies symbolize chastity and virtue.  The lily is also a fertility symbol in both Christian and pagan traditions.  In a Greek marriage ceremony, the bride will wear a crown made of lilies and wheat, which represents purity and abundance.  Lilies have also been placed on the graves of children, being a symbol of death.

It is enough that scientists – now more plainly than ever before – see the universal application of the illustration the more deeply they study nature, and can include their  “little brothers of the air” and the humblest flower at their feet when they say with Paul, “In God we live and move and have our being”.

A quote from Matthew 6:28-29 “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin; even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these”.

Tallest and most prolific of bloom among our native lilies, as it is the most variable in color, size, and form, is the Turk’s Cap or Turban Lily (L. superbum).  Travelers by rail between New York and Boston know how gorgeous the low meadows and marshes are in July or August, when its clusters of deep yellow, orange, or flame-colored lilies tower above the surrounding vegetation.

Like the color of most other flowers, the lily intensifies in salt air.  Commonly from three to seven lilies appears in a terminal group.  But under skillful cultivation, even forty will crown the stalk that reaches a height of about nine feet where its home suits it perfectly.

Lilies are a beautiful fragrant way to accent your home.  You may want to cut off the 6 stamens after the lily blooms – they may be colorful, but they will stain anything they fall onto.

The Frangipani flower is also known as Plumeria.  It is one of the most fragrant of all flowers in the world, and many people will claim the frangipani as their favorite scented flower – what a treat for the senses.  Hawaiian leis often include the Frangipani.  They range from white with yellowish centers to variations of pink having 5 petals.  It is native to Central America through Mexico spreading to tropical and subtropical areas in the world.

They are the most fragrant in the evening – this is to attract the sphinx moth to pollinate them.  These moths end up pollinating them by unintentionally transferring the pollen from flower to flower just because they are searching for their nectar – however the flowers have no nectar, so the moths keep going – flower to flower thinking they will get some.

Frangipani is more of the common name for Plumeria.  The Frangipani name comes from an Italian noble family of the 16^th century marquess who invented a perfume with the scent of the flower.  The frangipani is the flower of the city of Palermo in Sicily, Italy.

In the South Pacific – throughout Hawaii and Polynesia – a woman can indicate her relationship status by which ear she place the frangipani flower over.  If the flower is worn over the right ear, it means you are seeking a relationship – however, if it’s worn over the left ear, it will mean you are taken.

Some other interesting facts about the Frangipani – It has also been used in Swahili love poems – It is associated with love in Feng Shui – In other countries, it has been used as a flower for funerals and burials – The Frangipani is a good host for dendrobium orchids – The national flower of Nicaragua is the Frangipani – Leaves of the Frangipani are used as a healing wrap for ulcers and bruises and its latex is used as a liniment for rheumatism in Caribbean cultures – The Frangipani is also used in Vietnam for its healing qualities in which the bark is mashed in alcohol preventing skin inflammation and also used in treating indigestion and high blood pressure.

Many people love to grow Frangipanis.  As it is use to a tropical climate, some say to keep your frangipanis in a pot indoors.  However, if you live in the southern states, you can very well plant them outside.

There are many fine perfumes, therapeutic oils and creams that are made with the beautiful scent.  There’s nothing like floating in a bath infusing your senses with the frangipani scent as if you’re in a tropical garden – and then rubbing and drenching the scented lotion on your skin afterwards to top it off.

Tulips are a beautiful simple flower.  The species are perennials from bulbs.  The meaning of a tulip is generally perfect love.  They come in a variety of different colors.  The red tulip is mostly associated with true love.  White tulips are used to claim worthiness or send a message of forgiveness.  The yellow tulip once represented hopeless love, but has now evolved somewhat to being a common expression for cheerful thoughts and sunshine.  Purple tulips symbolize royalty.  And variable tulips represent striking eyes.

Tulips grew wild in Persia over a thousand years ago.  Near Kabul the Great Mogul Baber counted 33 different species.  In Europe, the tulip was considered to be the symbol of the Ottoman Empire.  Artists painted and drew it often and Persian poets sang its praises.

Tulip bulbs were brought back from Turkey by Venetian merchants and wealthy people began to purchase them.  In the early 1600’s, corsages of tulips were worn by fashionable French ladies and tulip designs were decorated on many fabrics.  In the 17^th century, just a small bed of tulips was valued at 15,000 to 20,000 francs.  The bulbs value was quoted like stocks and shares and the bulbs became a currency.

There was actually something called Tulipmania which flourished between 1634 and 1637.  It was similar to the California Gold Rush – people would abandon their jobs, homes, wives, lovers and businesses to become tulip growers.  This frenzy spread across France and Europe to the Low Countries.

It’s been recorded that a Dutchman paid 36 bushels of wheat, 72 of rice, 12 sheep, 4 oxen, 2 barrels of wine and 4 of beer, 8 pigs, 2 tons of butter, 1,000 pounds of cheese, clothes, a bed and a silver cup, just for one Vice-Roi bulb.

This obsession was beyond reason in a crazed population.  There are records showing one buyer paying 12 acres of land – and another buyer paying with a brand new carriage and 12 horses.  One story tells of a new owner, who, after paying for a bulb with its weight in gold, found out that a cobbler possessed the same variety.  He then bought the cobbler’s bulb and crushed it so that the value of his first bulb would increase.

After World War II, the Dutch shipped hundreds and thousands of tulip bulbs to Ottawa, Canada showing their gratitude to Canadian soldiers for freeing Holland from the German occupation and also for welcoming Queen Maria to reside in Ottawa while the war was raging on.

Wealthy people speculated on tulip shares.  Speculators held their meetings at the house of the noble family Van Bourse (the word bourse is derived from the mania) There were Monks in Flanders that grew most of the bulbs.  Bulbs were traded just like stock using paper representation of ownership.  It was in 1637 that speculation became illegal.  There were many people, especially in Holland, who were ruined as prices fell.

Tulip bulbs are actually eaten by some people, and the Japanese makes a kind of flour from them.

The orchid is so beautiful, that just one flower potted alone is a true treasure to observe.

The Orchid originates from Greece (orchis).  Some other names for orchids are Long Purples, Ladies’ Fingers, and Ladies’ Tresses.  It was thought by Greek women that if a pregnant mother ate the small tubers they would have a baby girl, and if the father at the large new tubers, then their unborn child would be a boy.

There are over 25,000 varieties of orchids.  One of the most famous orchids is the vanilla orchid.  It was said to give strength to the Aztecs who would drink vanilla mixed with chocolate.

Orchids have been symbolized for love, beauty and luxury over many centuries.  Orchids have also been used all the way back in the middle ages for remedies to a number of illnesses.

Orchid gardening and the collecting and care of orchids became an interest in the 18^th century.  Orchids were considered flowers of the wealthy and were studied by a few botanists including a man name William Cattley.  It was Cattley who changed all this – and there is an orchid name after him, the Cattleya orchid.  Cattley discovered that after re-potting the plant, it would blossom producing a beautiful and very fragrant flower.

According to some orchid books, it was in the late nineteenth century that orchids were being harvested in Europe without any consideration for saving them.  There were areas, particularly in England, that were devastated by this harvesting.  All orchids were picked, sold, and the fields were barren.  There was no conservation at this time.

However, today the harvesting of most wild orchids is for the most part banned.  There are some reputable orchid growers who reproduce them in greenhouses to sell.  Scientific studies and advancement have produced methods for creating over 110,000 different hybrids of the beautiful orchid.

There are hundreds of species of Honeysuckle.  Magenta, pink, or whitish with some yellow, sweat-scented, the tubular corollas set in dense round, oval, or egg-shaped heads about and inch long and seated in a sparingly hairy calyx.  They are common throughout the United States and Canada found in fields, meadows and roadsides.

The honeysuckle family (Caprifoliaceae) includes shrubs and vines variously called honeysuckle.  Japanese and Tartarian honeysuckles are invasive – and trumpet and woodbine honeysuckles are cultivated.  The Japanese honeysuckle was introduced from Japan and China around 1875 through 1897.  The Tartarian honeysuckle comes from Russia and was imported to the US during the 18^th century.

The Japanese honeysuckle was very popular in urban parks in the 1950’s through the 1970’s.  It was during the 1960’s that the USDA Soil Conservation Service got the word out to landscapers that they should plant honeysuckle to control erosion.  Wildlife managers in the eastern US would plant the vines for a food source to birds.  Forestry departments in the eastern US promoted honeysuckle, had it planted in public places, detailed it in wildlife literature and made it available at state horticulture sales.

In the 1980’s, ecologists realized the Japanese honeysuckle was invasive.  Its vines can over-take, weigh down and eventually destroy livestock containment fences.  Japanese Honeysuckle is hard to eradicate.

Trumpet honeysuckle is very beneficial.  It’s grown for the bright red blooms which will draw in humming birds.  Woodbine honeysuckle has fragrant, orange-red blooms and is popular in eastern gardens.  It’s unlikely it will invade the wild because of its susceptibility to scale insect infestation.

The Honeysuckle mostly is admired for its beauty and fragrance.  The flowers produce a sweat, edible nectar.  They attract humming birds and butterflies.  They have such an alluring and enticing fragrance when you break the stem.  Honeysuckle oil is a popular scent and is said to symbolize a bond of love and devoted love.  It has been extracted and made into soaps, candles, perfumes and creams.

The Iris (Iridaceae) can be violet-blue variegated with yellow, green, or white and purple veined.

This gorgeous flower is thought by scientists to be all that it is for the bees’ benefit, which of course it its own also.  Abundant moisture, from which to manufacture nectar – a prime necessity with most irises – certainly is for our blue flag.  The large, showy blossom always attracts the passing bee, whose favorite color (according to Sir John Lubbock) it waves.

The bee alights on the convenient, spreading platform, and guided by the dark veining and golden lines leading to the nectar, sips the delectable fluid shortly to be changed to honey.  Now, as he raises his head and withdraws it from the nectary, he must rub it against the pollen-laden anther above, and some of the pollen necessarily falls on the visitor.  As the sticky side of the plate (stigma), just under the petal-like division of the style, faces away from the anther, which is below it in any case, the flower is marvelously guarded against fertilization from its own pollen.

The bee, flying off to another iris, must first brush past the projecting lip of the over-arching style, and leave on the stigmatic outer surface of the plate some of the pollen brought from the first flower, before reaching the nectary.  Thus, cross-fertilization is effected – and Darwin has shown how necessary this is to insure the most vigorous and beautiful offspring.

“The fleur-de-lys, which is the flower of chivalry”, says Ruskin, “has a sword for its leaf and a lily for its heart”.  When that young and pious Crusader, Louis VII, adopted it for the emblem of his house, spelling was scarcely an exact science, and the fleur-de-Louis soon became corrupted into its present form.

Doubtless the royal flower was the white iris, and as “li” is the Celtic for white, there is room for another theory as to the origin of the name.  It is our far more regal looking, but truly democratic blossom, jostling its fellows in the marshes, that is indeed “born in the purple”.

The name Iris, meaning a deified rainbow, which was given this group of plants by the ancients, shows a fine appreciation of their superb coloring, their ethereal texture, and the evanescent beauty of the blossom.

St. John’s-Wort (Hypericaceae) produces abundant bright yellow flowers, 1 inch across or less, with several or many in terminal clusters.  It is a perennial plant and grows naturally throughout much of the world

The shrubby St. John’s-Wort (H. prolificum), which are provided with stamens so numerous, the many flowered terminal clusters have a soft, feathery effect.  In the axils of the oblong, opposite leaves are tufts of smaller ones, the stout stems being often concealed under a wealth of foliage.  Sandy or rocky places from New Jersey southward best suit this low, dense diffusely branched shrub which blooms prolifically from July to September.

Farther north, and westward to Iowa, the Great or Giant St. John’s-Wort (H. Ascyron) brightens the banks of streams at midsummer with large blossoms, each on a long footstalk in a few-flowered cluster.

The flowers and stems of St. John’s Wort have been used to prepare yellow and red colored dyes.

St. John’s-Wort’s history is rather interesting . . .

“Gathered upon a Friday, in the hour of Jupiter when he comes to his operation, so gathered, or borne, or hung upon the neck, it mightily helps to drive away all phantastical spirits.”  These are the blossoms which have been hung in the windows of European peasants for ages on St. John’s eve, to avert the evil eye and the spells of the spirits of darkness.

“Devil chaser” – its Italian name signifies.  To cure demoniacs, to ward off destruction by lightning, to reveal the presence of witches, and to expose their nefarious practices, are some of the virtues ascribed to this plant.

The flower gets its name from St. John the Baptist and is often harvested around St. John’s Day –  the superstition that on St. John’s Day, the 24^th of June, the dew which fell on the plant the evening before was efficacious in preserving the eyes from disease.  So the plant was collected, dipped in oil, and thus transformed into a balm for every wound.

St. John’s Wort has been used for about 2400 years for many different purposes throughout its history.  Today it’s more common for St. John’s-Wort to be extracted and used as a popular formula in herbal medicine for depression and anxiety. It is a combination of St. John’s Wort’s main ingredient, hypericin, along with the whole plant extracted including its xanthones and flavonoids which makes it a more potent antidepressant.  It also appears to help the immune system combat viruses.

The beauty of silk flowers!  My favorites are kept in big beautiful originally designed glass vases spread all throughout my home.

Silk flowers can really add to the atmosphere along with any fresh flowers you’ve just gotten.

Silk flowers are so life-like you can surely be fooled to think they are real.  They are flowers that will never die – You never have to water silk flowers – and although they may be missing the scent of fresh flowers – You can actually give them a light spray every now and then with your favorite flower fragrance to mimic the lovely smell.

The history of silk flowers and clothing can stem way back to the 27^th century BC with the Chinese creating these silk goods.

Around the time of 1254 – 1324, Marco Polo had brought back the art crafts and the Italians started making silk flowers, which then spread to France where the French improved the quality of both flowers and fabrics.  And by the late 18^th century, French silk flowers were exported to England.  In the 19^th century English immigrants took silk flowers to the New World.

There was a Parisian flower company that had its offices both in the United States and France.  They started supplying silk wedding flowers and other silk floral arrangements.  And by the 1920’s, when flowers were out of season, florists started to replace and sell silk flowers arranged in vases.

Then in between the 1920’s and 1930’s, decorative ornaments made of silk along with silk fruits and vegetables in the Italian della Robbia style became popular.  By the 1970’s, you could get silk flowers made at lower prices from Taiwan.  And today, many of the silk flowers, plants, fruits and trees are being imported from China and Thailand.

Many people who are artistically inclined like to make their own silk flowers as a hobby and for enjoyment.  It’s truly miraculous how one can create such magic with silk turning it into something so beautiful and so real looking.

There are many benefits that can be gained by using silk flowers.  They are definitely a beautiful way to boost the creative look of your home.  While both silk flowers and traditional arrangements offer beauty and festivity, only silk flower arrangements are economical and long lasting – for a one-time price, whether making them on your own or buying them, they will last forever.