Sapiua & The yellow dahlia
A design by Sarah Ryhanen
There is a dahlia on the farm that is one of my prize possessions. No one seems to know what it's called, I don’t remember where I got the tuber, and I fail to label it every year when I dig up dahlias from the field and collect them from planter pots. Regardless it shows up with the spectacle of a sudden prophecy in late September, tucked singularly amidst the rows of cafe au laits in the field, or, this year in a pot outside the soap factory.
In brief, its color can be best described as highlighter yellow, but allow me to go on: its petals - angular and elegantly well-spaced - arch back gracefully into a near sphere. The dahlia is the Tilda Swinton of dahlias. Strikingly beautiful, untraditional, fashion forward. This dahlia glows from the inside out. It vibrates.
Said specimen bloomed a few weeks ago, as I said, by surprise this year in a big pot by the soap factory. I left it there for a week. It remained perfect on the plant while a second one bloomed behind it. Of course farm staff and visitors all talked about it a bit. Everyone admired it and knew that to cut it would be grounds for immediate termination or expulsion from Worlds End.
The pots of dahlias by buildings here eluded the first frosts. By the time our season ended October 15th, the first stem was about 2 weeks old and the second stood there equally bright and stellar, just slightly smaller. The day everyone left the farm, I immediately cut them both and took them into the barn to make good with them. Sometimes people ask if it’s hard for me to cut my prize flowers and the simple truth is NO. I’m a cutter; always have been first and mostly a florist and then a grower. The reason I waited to cut these flowers was because I felt I needed privacy - and that’s harder for me to explain. I don’t mind sharing pictures or thoughts of flowers - I really enjoy being filmed arranging flowers - but sometimes, with something particular, I don’t want to be watched. I want the moment to myself. Later I can share it but I don’t want someone walking by and interrupting.
The time it took to make this little arrangement was less than 5 min. The real effort was in the years of accidental development of these dahlias - from likely a mistaken purchase or extra tuber thrown in to a mail order of usual suspects. This is the first year I’ve photographed it.
Then there was the time walking around collecting the cast of characters from around the yard and garden to complete the performance. I started this process days earlier, noting some oddly white ferns growing by the driveway, and cataloging it in my mind for a future ensemble. I suppose I have a few rules or thoughts about the resulting arrangement;
1. The dahlias themselves are so striking (highlighter yellow!) so to pair them with another leading performer (i.e. another ‘focal’ or ‘face flower’ such as a garden rose or another variety of dahlia) would be, in my humble opinion, confusing for my eye. Who is the star? A garden rose maybe - perhaps a small one almost in bloom and then a little bud, but even then, a rose throws a certain feminine romance into the story, and this is Tilda remember, its a different breed of romance altogether.
2. The foliage for this composition has the effect of toning down that outlandish, acid yellow. As I walked around collecting materials, I was looking for crackle, burnish, spots and a healthy dose of decay to counter balance the clean siren of these dahlias. The season helps do this - for contrast, imagine pairing Tilda with the bright green foliage and white blossoms of a spring Crabapple or the flabby straight-forward appeal of a Kousa Dogwood? It would not compute. I picked spotted Maple leaves, the long gestural needle-like leaves of Amsonia, and the fat, fading chartreuse foliage of my long gone peonies. Technically I would include the one piece of Goldenrod (bottom right) as foliage, as well as the few pieces of almost albino ferns I found in the dark woods.
3. There are two other supporting floral roles here, one minor - a single, stunted, mysteriously late blooming paniculata hydrangea that had a fresh, new greenish tinge to it. Out of character for the season, and I realize this stands in contrast to my last sentiment - but perfect somehow (we contain multitudes) and then the autumn anemones which need more than a sentence to describe. First, these anemones are some of my favorite and most prized possessions on the farm. And as we now know, my track record for keeping and caring for the flowers I like the best is not my strong suit. I have planted many varieties of autumn anemones around in gardens, in borders, 25 of the white blooming variety along side the front of the farmhouse. I often fail to weed them, and without good care here in zone 5, they dwindle. Which was why this purple one, right outside the barn was such a pleasant surprise when I came about it making its own story amidst the ragweed and thistle.
For me the anemone has the effect of a punctuation - not unlike a cosmo, a small rudbeckia or a scabiosa, but with more depth and intrigue. I cut both the flower and some stems where the flower was spent leaving only the pearl sized sepal (receptacle?). This use of the same species but at different stages is a great tool of mine and a wonderful talking point when discussing the fact that for some, indeed for many of us here, there is a desire to mimic the natural rhythm of the garden in the vase indoors. Something is always blooming but at different stages; and there is no perfection or prized pinnacle in any one stage in a plant. Some of you may argue me on this, I welcome it.
I also welcome, by all means, any positive official identification of my beloved dahlia. Even though doing so risks erasing the mystery and graduating this special yellow bloom to a full 50ft. row (at least) in my field next year as opposed to some odd, singular beauty mark that shows up on the farm along with the other mystery tubers.
