Perennials to Add to Your Yard for Cut Flower Bouquets
A Beginners Guide for Starting a Cut Flower Garden
Mixed perennial bouquet with shades of pink, white and burgandy
Fresh cut flowers are a quintessential addition to brighten any space or anyone’s day. Tending plants from the smallest of seeds into colorful beauties brings a wonderful sense of accomplishment and joy. In addition a home grown floral bouquet is a wonderful gift to be able to share with others. If you want to enjoy lovely bouquets year after year, the easiest way to ensure this is by planting the best perennials for cut flowers in your landscape, backyard or gardens.
Four years ago our family moved and we landscaped our new home. I specifically chose perennial flowers, ornamental grasses and flowering shrubs that make great cut flowers arrangements and I could easily incorporate into my landscape. My goal was to have easy-to-grow perennials that I could enjoy for bouquets all summer long. It was a fun project that all four of my children helped with. In addition, we also planted easy-to-grow annuals for cut flowers, which you can check out here.
Hydrangeas under front porch
Incorporate perennials into your landscape (Siberian Iris)
For years I worked at my family’s nursery, and picked up a love for flowers and a basic plant knowledge. Through trial and error in my own garden, I’m excited to share some great landscape tips.
No matter your previous gardening experience, I’m sharing relatively easy perennials and flowering shrubs to grow for beginners. Even if you’re a complete novice with plants or were born without a green thumb, these hardy plants and bushes will work with little maintenance.
Enjoy Bouquets all Summer Long
I live in Southwest Michigan in zone 6.
I only recommend products I would use myself and all opinions expressed here are my own. This post may contain affiliate links that add no additional cost to you, I may earn a small commission to help offset the cost of my blog.
What is a Cut Flower Garden?
Cut flower gardens are grown intentionally for cutting and creating bouquets or floral arrangements. The specific flowers are chosen based on their bloom time, size and color. Look for plants that have longer stems and a long shelf life in a vase. They are generally a mix of annuals, perennials, flowering bushes, and filler plants. Intentionally choosing flowers with staggered bloom times will allow you to enjoy bouquets through the spring, summer and fall.
If you have limited space, try integrating perennials and flowers into your landscape, vegetable garden or along a backyard fence. Choosing perennial plants and flowering shrubs that produce lovely floral blooms is a simple way to have access to flowers to brighten any space.
Tips for Planting Perennials for Cutting
Spring and fall are the best times to plant perennials.
Check the care instructions for your plant. Choose a sunny spot, part sun or shady location depending on your perennials needs. Monitor the spot throughout the day to assess how much sun and wind protection this area gets.
Save the plant identification tag. In the excitement of planting a new perennial or shrub, you may toss the tag or think you will remember, but its best to keep these in one spot to reference later for care instructions and name.
Start with a good soil base. Choose a location and rich soil with nutrients. Adding organic matter including compost, leaf litter, and composted manure will add nutrients to the soil and assist with proper water retention and drainage. We utilize an outdoor tumbler compost bin and an indoor odorless compost bin for our kitchen scraps, which has made composting simple and easy. If you don’t have those resources, choose a quality potting soil to mix into your garden area.
When planting, loosen up the roots and soil before placing in the hole, especially if they are root bound.
Water thoroughly after initial planting. Ideally water early in the morning at the base to avoid fungal diseases.
Certain flowers need support with plant support stakes such as Peonies.
Three Types of Flowers for your Bouquets
Annuals Plants need to be planted each year or annually because they only last for one growing season. Annuals typically have a much longer blooming period then perennials.
Perennials Plants come back every year in the spring but typically have a shorter bloom time compared to annuals.
Fillers These are comprised of plants, grasses, flowers and greenery that can be used to make a bouquet appear fuller. It can include ornamental grasses, raspberry leaves, hostas, foliage from bushes or bunches of smaller flower clusters.
Best Perennials to Grow for Beginners for Cut Flowers Bouquets
Investing in perennials and flowering shrubs for your yard is well worth the initial time, effort and price. Year after year your family can enjoy the beautiful bouquets.
Sun Loving Perennials to Add to Your Yard for Cut Flowers
Yarrow
Yarrow
Yarrow’s small cluster-like flowers are a delicate accent filler with tons of different colors, including white and pastels. They thrive in full sun and dry conditions. The white variety is quite useful and works with any floral color scheme.
Cone Flower
With strong sturdy stems and unique cone shaped centers, coneflowers easily add interest to floral bouquets. Purple coneflower, which actually is a pink shade is lovely, as well as the white coneflower.
Peony Bushes
These stunning beauties need no explanation, with full blooms that make stunning bouquets, they will quickly be a favorite. They thrive in full sun areas. Due to the large flower blooms, they often require staking. By planting them next to a sturdy fence you naturally reap the benefits of a structural support.
Autumn Joy Sedum florets are paired with pink Zinnias and Dahlias and White cosmos
Autumn Joy Sedum
Bearded Iris
This drought tolerate perennial is a late season blooms. In summer and into the fall this plant produces rosy -colored blooms, perfectly timed with sunflowers. I love that the green florets can also be added to vases before it even flowers and works great as a filler. They love full sun and require little maintenance.
Iris
Both Bearded Iris and Siberian Iris make striking displays in a vase. Ask around because these flowers needed to be divided every 3 or 4 years to avoid overcrowding and neighbors often will share.
Shasta Daisies (Becky) is one of the tallest varieties and makes a good cut flower. The classic white and yellow daisy is shown below in this lovely bouquet. These cheery flowers with the yellow centers will brighten anyone’s day!
White Shasta Daisies in a Bouquet
Roses
Hybrid Tea Roses make some of the most fragrant and elegant additions to any bouquet. These sun loving plants come in a wide range of colors from yellows, purples and classic reds.
Lavender
In my personal opinion any bouquet is better when adding the relaxing scent of lavender. Lavender adds height and interest to bouquets with their long purple floral stems. These fragrant beauties need a sunny site with well drained soil.
Veronica Speedwell
This easy-to-grow perennial has spikey blooms that last all summer long if you deadhead often. Choose a taller variety for the best cut flowers. Veronica comes in various hues of purple, white and pink.
Part Sun/ Shade Loving Perennial Plants and Flowery Shrubs
Hydrangeas
An all time favorite flowering shrub, that produces large bountiful blooms is the hydrangea. The stunning blushing bride hydrangea shifts from white, to pink and then fades to a dark rusty, pink color. It prefers part shade and moist well drained soil. Late in the season it can be used to make a great dried flower arrangement. Depending on if the hydrangea is old wood or new wood will dictate when you cut back or trim your hydrangea. Picture below is Fire Light Paniculata Hydrangea.
Fire Light Paniculata Hydrangea
Astilbe
These shade loving perennials produce plumes of red, white and pink, depending on the variety. Personally I love using them in bouquets to add height and interest.
Bulbs and Tuber Plants
Dahlias
Dahlia
Dahlia plants are tubers and are undeniably one of the most show stopping blooms. Often they are the featured star and focal point of bouquets. With hundreds of different varieties, select ones that have long stems and height. Dahlia tubers an be planted after the last threat of frost. Ideally plant in full sun and well-drained soil. There is a caveat, if you want to keep your Dahlias for the next season in colder zones 3-6) there is some additional work. At the end of the season, dahlia tubers must be dug up and stored in a dry place over the winter months. Then divide and replant in the spring after the last frost.
Gladiolas
My husband for years brought me home gladiolas since there was a farm on his way home from work. Since that gladiola grower closed down, I decided I needed to grow my own. These tall beauties are gorgeous in a bouquet all their own. They love sunny location and mine come up each year since they are in a protected locations.
Gladiola
Tulips
These flowers need no explanation. With a vast array of colors, these quintessential spring flowers are a favorite for lovely bouquets! Plant tulips in the fall to enjoy in the spring.
Daffodils
Yellow daffodils might just be the cheeriest flower of all the bulbs. Plant these beauties in the fall to enjoy blooms in the spring time. These deer resistant bulbs love a sunny location.
Tips for Harvesting Cut Flowers
Rule of thumb, never cut more than 1/3 of the flowers off a plant or shrub.
Gather flowers in early morning or later evening during cooler temperatures. Avoid the hottest heat of mid day and afternoon.
Collect flowers stems in a bucket or vase filled with cool water so these beauties can start absorbing liquid immediately.
Utilize a clean, sharp pair of gardening shears or scissors. Start by cutting the stems at an angle and making sure to keep a long length of stem. Later, you can always recut them once you’re arranging the vase. These are the gardening shears I use for nice clean cuts.
Choose flower blooms that have just started to open up for a longer vase life.
A common mistake I’ve witnessed is not adding greenery or fillers to bouquets. Consider adding foliage and stems from green shrubs, raspberry leaves, bushes, herbs, variegated hosta leaves and perennial grasses from your yard. By adding these different fillers, it allows fuller more interesting bouquet. Additionally wildflowers like Queen Anne’s Lace and cat tails are easy to add to your bouquets and often grow wild. Personally I adore adding herbs like scented lavender and basil, which our a lovely fragrant addition to arrangements. Go ahead and try different combinations and experiment with adding different plants around your yard to create your own one-of-a kind bouquets.
Tips for Making Cut Flowers Last Longer
Once you’ve selected your flowers, you’re ready to begin arranging your bouquet in a vase. Here are simple steps to extend the life of your floral bouquet.
First strip any leaves that will be submerged in water on the lower part of the stem. (This helps avoid leaves rotting in the water.)
Cut stems again at a sharp angle to allow for greater water absorption.
Sprinkle the water in the vase with a small amount of Cut Flower Food.
Freshly cut flowers absorb a ton of water through their stems so monitor the water level in the vase, especially on day one.
Change the vase’s water daily or when you notice that it has become cloudy or murky.
When refilling the water, re-cut the stems and sprinkle cut flower food into the vase again.
Continuously remove spent blooms, flowers or leaves from the bouquet.
As your bouquet gets smaller as you remove old blooms downsize to a tinier vase.
Ways to Reduce the Initial Cost for Perennials
Although the initial start up cost is greater than packets of annual seeds, these beauties will deliver continuous blooms year after year making them a valuable investment. There are several ways to reduce the cost of acquiring perennial & shrubs.
1. Add just a few new plants each year from your local nursery to reduce the cost. That gives you time to learn about each unique plant and build confidence in your horticulture skills.
2. Exchange or swap plants with other individuals in your community such as neighbors or friends. Some perennials like iris, lilies and hostas perform the best when they are divided and don’t become overcrowded.
Benefits of Planting a Cut Flower Garden with Kids
Children adore growing plants and there are tons of other benefits for teaching children to garden
Health benefits while being outside in nature.
Increased harvest for Vegetable gardens , flowers attract bees which helps spread pollen and fertilize your vegetables.
Teach your children patience, responsibility and delayed gratification while growing flowers, as they weed, water and wait for plants to grow.
Bless others through gifted bouquets. (Throughout the spring and summer, our family chooses friends and family to encourage with a cherry vase of flowers.)
Learn hands on about each plant life cycles.
Add beauty in your yard with flowering shrubs, perennials and annuals.
Closing Thoughts
As your confidence grows, you can experiment with new plants and learn their specific nuisances and requirements. In addition, continually selecting perennial plants and bushes will add dimension and beauty to your backyard. What a joy it is to be able to enjoy fresh cut flowers directly from your own garden and home landscape. I adore adding a bit of color and cheer into my home interior, don’t you?
We loved making bouquets so much we even started a roadside flower stand. My 4 children enjoy sharing our flowers and extra garden vegetables with the community. We put out a tip jar for donations and my children even earn a bit of extra money for their effort.
So get started this spring with your very own cut flower garden and enjoy fresh floral bouquets throughout the summer, while gifting them to others. Flowers have the capacity to bring joy to recipients, trigger nostalgic memories from a familiar smell, and nurture a greater appreciate for the beauty found in nature. We hope you take time to plant some this year.
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