No longer naff — carnations are now chic!
FOR too long carnations, with their peachy frilly folds and jagged edges, have been relegated to the sidelines of floristry and fashion.
Associated with funerals and old people’s homes, we’re used to seeing them drooping in supermarket buckets – the last pick of the bunch – rather than scenting the air of exclusive events.
Deemed cheap, twee, dated and – worst of all – naff, the best a carnation could hope for was to be used as a filler in a bouquet next to starrier, more expensive blooms such as roses, peonies and lilies.
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, carnations have made a high fashion comeback. ‘People are realising you can buy beautiful quality flowers with heads as big as a rose,’ says Flowerbx founder Whitney Bromberg Hawkings, who worked with fashion designer Tom Ford for almost two decades. She has seen sales of two-tone varieties rise 712 per cent since last year.
‘They come in more than 300 colours. Fashion and beauty brands order them a lot more. They’ve become a cool, interesting, bold flower choice.’
Libertine used printed pink and red carnations across sleek black dresses and jackets for spring-summer 2024. Erdem stamped carnation prints throughout recent collections while Bottega Veneta’s latest ad features triumphant orange carnations (alongside the rapper A$AP).
While the cost-of-living crisis is unlikely to be a factor for their popularity with designer fashion brands, it may well explain why they’re flying off florists’ shelves. ‘They are really easy to style,’ adds Bromberg Hawkings. ‘You don’t need extreme floristry skills.
‘But they have to be in single stem bunches. When they are mixed that’s where it all goes wrong because it’s not celebrating the boldness and the simplicity of the carnation. It becomes immediately naff.’
So if you get a bunch of — single stem — carnations this Wednesday, smile, they’re now far more haute couture than garage forecourt.