Paeonia lactiflora Bouquet Perfect

The Bouquet Perfect Peony (Paeonia lactiflora) is a Chinese or Herbaceous Peony that stands out for the originality and refinement of its remarkably graceful flowers, its intense colour, and the sweetness of its fragrance. It is a fairly recent variety with mid-season flowering. It produces a large number of medium-sized flowers, very dense in the centre, surrounded by single petals in a corolla on the periphery, all in a bright pink colour, without stamens. Dominating intense green foliage, the flowers rise on rigid stems, giving a graceful appearance to the flowering and offering a beautiful arrangement of the flowers in a bouquet.  

Chinese herbaceous peonies mainly derive from Paeonia lactiflora, a perennial herbaceous plant native to central and eastern Asia (from eastern Tibet to northern China and eastern Siberia), where it naturally grows in woods and meadows. This plant belongs to the Ranunculaceae or Paeoniaceae family. Herbaceous peonies, perennial by virtue of their roots, form a clump of foliage that completely disappears in winter. Easy to grow in all regions, they thrive in loose and rather moist soil, in the sun. Robust and faithful, they sometimes take a little time to establish themselves, but they develop year after year and can live for more than 50 years. 

The Bouquet Perfect Chinese Peony was obtained by R.W. Tischler in Minnesota (United States) in 1987. The plant forms a herbaceous and bushy clump from spring onwards, moderately dense, reaching 90 cm (35in) in all directions. Its large double flowers, 12 to 14 cm (5 to 6in) in diameter, appear in mid-season, earlier or later in June depending on the climate, lasting for about three weeks. They grow at the end of the stems, but also from a few secondary buds. They start as a pale pink bud and then open into a double and very dense pompom in the centre, surrounded by single petals in a corolla on the periphery, all in a bright pink colour, barely purple, without stamens. The growth of this variety is good and it has remarkable longevity. The young purple and shiny foliage unfolds into large, dark green, highly dissected leaves. They are carried on a petiole that divides into 3, with lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate segments. The leaflets are entire or sometimes lobed. The vegetation disappears in winter, while the buds persist at ground level and develop again in spring. This long-lived perennial plant grows from a large fleshy root that does not appreciate being moved.

Chinese Peonies are among those plants that form the basis of a garden. The Bouquet Perfect peony thrives in borders or alongside pathways, combined with timeless and unpretentious perennials such as Irises, Columbines, bellflowers, perennial geraniums, carnations or Christmas roses. It can also be grown in the vegetable garden to supply cut flowers for the house. Pot cultivation is not recommended, as its needs will not be met. Over time peonies becomes majestic and bloom ever more abundantly, producing up to 60 flowers. By combining different varieties with staggered flowering, it is possible to have blooms for 6 weeks from spring to early summer.