So, for today’s Flower Friday, we’re going to feature a brand new type of flower that we grew for the first time this season! Today, we’re going to talk about Lace Flower!
We don’t talk about it much, but one of the things we’re trying to do is build familiarity with many of the major genus and families of flowers that we can grow. There are so many different kinds of flowers out there, it’ll take a lifetime to experiment with and understand a good portion of them. On this journey, it’s been important for us to “tear apart” the families, genus and species that we’re growing.
Put simply, we weren’t prepared for this one! We’re not going to spend much time on the medical and culinary uses of this flower. Honestly, because we don’t entirely understand it yet. Instead, we’re going to explore the oddities and inconsistencies surrounding what is known as “Lace Flower.”
Very curiously, the name “Lace Flower” is a rather ambiguous one. Quite a few different and somewhat unrelated species and flower families seem to lay claim to this name. Typically, the common name that many growers use refers to a specific family or species of flower. But, in the case of Lace Flower, it appears to describe the “look” of a plant’s given flowers as opposed to anything more specific.
In our research, we found that there are at least six different species of plants, all referred to as laceflower. This is normally not a big deal, but these species don’t even roll up into the same family origins. In some cases, they are completely different orders of plants, meaning there’s zero relationship whatsoever!
The only semi-consistency is that a lot of the plants known as “laceflower” roll up into the Apiales order of plants. Which, that encompasses a massive number of plants! But some common ones you’ll be familiar with, such as celery, carrot, parsley and ginseng. Curiously, when these plants flower, they also look somewhat like lace flowers!
As far as we can tell, there was this historic figure named Queen Anne that likely coined the name “lace flower” to identify particular kinds of flowers she liked. Oddly, history doesn’t even agree one “which” Queen Anne this was, it could have been two or maybe three of them. After this point in history, a common name of “Queen Anne’s lace flower” was used to describe several of these species of flowers. The only thing we can “sort of” pinpoint is that “lace flower” came to be sometime between the early 1500’s and early 1700’s.
This is quite “recent” history, really, so it’s odd that the origins are as muddy as they are. While there’s always uncertainties about specifics when it comes to the history of various flowers, lace flower appears to be somewhat unique in its broad classification of various species. So, this means we’re both “sure” and “not sure” what a lace flower is at the same time!
Regardless, we’ve enjoyed this flower immensely. It’s been a great attractor for bees and also a staple in our flower arrangements this year. It’s a charming flower and we really enjoy the color of this particular species. We will be moving up our sowing schedule for this flower next year, we often adjust our sowing schedules based on personal experience. We think this flower could come in a bit earlier, as opposed to a late season bloom like we saw and this isn’t uncommon for our “first time” growing something!
