Celebrate spring with tulips

• Posted on 29 January 2025
• By Annelies
• 0

Would you like to bring spring into your home with a cheerful flower? The tulip is the perfect choice! This colorful flower comes in different varieties and symbolizes many beautiful things, such as love, loyalty and new beginnings. Whether you want to give a bouquet or brighten up your garden, the tulip offers something for everyone. Discover everything about this versatile flower, from care to the meaning of the colors, and bring some extra color into your life!

If there is one flower that is perfect to celebrate spring, it is the tulip.

A bouquet with these cheerful spring stems immediately brings some extra cheer into your home. The tulip is the ideal gift to surprise someone with. With a bouquet of tulips you give more than just flowers. The tulip has many different meanings! Want to know more about the name of the tulip? Their symbolic meaning? The colors of the tulip?

Different tulips

There are many different types of tulips. Many different colors, but also different shapes.

- Single tulips: are tulips with a single petal. This is the ordinary tulip as we know it.

- Double tulips: are easily recognized by their full, rich flowers. This tulip has many more petals than a single tulip.

- Parakeet tulips: are a unique type of tulip that you do not often encounter. The flowers of these tulips are smaller than other varieties, but have a beautiful pattern of different colors.

- Fringed tulips: are tulips with a fringe or ribbon on the petals. This version of the popular flower is perfect for wedding decorations or other special occasions.

- Peony tulips: are a popular tulip variety that many people like to have in their garden. All peony tulips are double tulips. Peony tulips are beautiful flowers with large petals.

- French tulips: is the big sister of the single tulip. She is a lot bigger, longer and more expressive. This version is mainly grown in France, where it is grown in the open without additional heat or artificial light. These natural conditions ensure that growth is relatively slow. But everything that grows slowly and is not forced also becomes stronger.

A bit of history

Tulips originally come from Turkey and were only introduced to the Netherlands in the 16th century. It was Carolus Clusius who started growing tulips in the garden of the Hortus Botanicus in Leiden. The product was scarce at the time and therefore only available to rich people.

The turnaround came in the 20th century and almost half of the Dutch bulb fields were full of tulips and since then 1.6 billion tulip bulbs and 2.4 billion tulip flowers have been traded at home and abroad every year. And the price? Fortunately, a bunch of tulips is now very affordable for everyone.

Origin

When the tulip from Iran, Afghanistan and Kazakhstan arrived in Turkey, it quickly became the icing on the cake for tough sultans. They put a tulip in their turban. The flower was then given the name 'tulipan', which means turban.

A long journey

Around 1550, Turkey was a powerful country. The palace gardens of the wealthy Sultan Suleiman were full of the most beautiful tulips. At that time, a human life was worth less than one tulip. Sultan Suleiman therefore enjoyed quite a bit of prestige. This powerful man exceptionally gave tulips as a gift to a guest, and one day a nobleman from Flanders was the lucky one. This nobleman then donated the floral treasures to a friend, who was in charge of the herb garden of the Emperor of Austria.

Symbolism of the Tulip

The tulip is one of our national symbols and is therefore a colorful calling card. Just like every flower, this flower also has different meanings, namely devotion, loyalty, love, new beginnings and spring. Nice to give as a gift!

Communicate colorfully

There are many different types of tulips. And it doesn't stop there, because each type is also available in different colors. Curious about what exactly the specific color you want to give as a gift entails? Below you will find the most common colors of tulips and their meaning!

- Red tulips: represent eternal and true love, but also friendship and loyalty. Is there someone you really like whether it is a friend, lover or family member? With the red tulip you show how much they mean to you.

- Yellow tulips: represents appreciation, but also warmth, cheerfulness and conviviality. They are perfect to give to someone who is always there for you, or to celebrate a pleasant moment. Consider, for example, a birthday, spring party or housewarming!

- Orange tulips: represents energy and enthusiasm. That makes it perfect to give to someone who wants to congratulate you: for example on a new job or a new home!

- White tulips: you may have guessed it: the white tulip represents purity, innocence and purity. In addition, white tulips symbolize forgiveness. Ideal if you want to apologize to someone.

- Pink tulips: symbolizes motherly love, elegance and affection, but also happiness. Is it almost Mother's Day and is the mother (figure) or power woman in your life a fan of tulips? Then give a bouquet with pink tulips or a design with a pink tulip. Also good to know: the pink tulip is also the perfect gift if you want to wish someone good luck!

- Purple tulips: When you give someone purple tulips as a gift, you are essentially saying that you look up to or respect that person. Purple tulips are therefore perfect as a gift for a role model such as a teacher, parent or grandparent. In addition, purple tulips are also a good gift for someone who could use some extra peace and spiritual deepening.

- All colors of tulips: represents elegance. If you receive such a bouquet from someone, it is of course a huge compliment, because it contains all the above messages!

How do you recognize the tulip?

Tulips are one of the most famous flowers, so you'll probably recognize it when you see one. The narrow, slightly inward growing flowers in many different colors often stand out in a garden or bouquet. Over the past centuries, many mutations have emerged with slightly different shapes and colors.

As a cut flower and as a garden plant

The tulip is therefore both a garden plant and a cut flower. As a garden plant they logically last a lot longer. But a bouquet of tulips is of course extremely suitable as a gift. Although tulip bulbs are also nice to receive and give.

Care

If you plant tulip bulbs in your garden, you must of course take a number of care measures. For example, it is best to cut off the flower after flowering so that it produces new bulbs more easily. As soon as the plant starts to wither, it is best to remove the bulbs from the ground and store them indoors temporarily. To do this, first wipe the soil from the bulbs and then place them in a moisture-free space in your basement, for example. You can then simply put them back in the ground the following year and new tulips will emerge.

Location

As a garden plant, the tulip is less picky about its location. A spot in partial shade is sufficient, although the tulip can also handle a little sun.

Have you received a bouquet of tulips? The best location is a cool place, preferably out of the sun as much as possible. To prevent them from wilting quickly, it is wise to keep your tulips away from your fruit bowl.

Planting bulbs

When you decide to brighten up your garden with tulips, you must first plant the tulip bulbs. This is best done in the fall, when the leaves start to fall from the plants. You plant the bulb about 15 centimeters deep. Cover the bulbs with soil and wait until they produce their most beautiful flowers at the beginning of the year!

Propagate

You can propagate tulip bulbs quite easily. If you remove the tulip bulbs from the ground, you will see small bulbs growing on them. You can remove them and plant them next fall. The new tulip bulbs will probably not immediately produce beautiful large tulips, this may take a year or two. The first few years will probably only produce a stem and some leaves.

Bouquets with tulips

You can often find tulips in bouquets with only tulips and greenery. This is mainly because the tulips are still growing a bit. A bouquet with only tulips will bring early spring into your home.

Fun fact  

- Tulip bulbs are edible

- Besides blue and black, there are all colors of tulips.

- Did you know that the tulip does not go together with the daffodil? The toxins that the daffodil secretes are harmful to the tulip.

- There are more than 8.000 tulip varieties.

Would you like to order bouquets of tulips?

Would you like to order a bouquet of tulips? Choose from one of our beautiful bouquets and treat yourself or someone else!