Description
‘Hera’
2W-WWY
[Leedsii, 4a]
(De Graaff Brothers, pre-1914)
A curious choice of name for such a modest poppet of a flower; a favourite of ours. A tidy flower on opening, the overlapping perianth, held perpendicular to the corona, is of remarkably good form for a 1914 flower. The corona’s rim, and closely and regularly arranged pleats, are palest ivory-lemon parchment at first; the rim sometimes tipped palest soft peachy pink. As the flower matures the milk-white perianth segments become more spreading, sometimes twisted, and as the corona expands to a short wide funnel the pleats become more pronounced – wider and higher – and the mouth more ruffled and irregular in outline. Although the colour usually drains from the corona, leaving it milky parchment, the deeper ruffles can be tipped bright pale lemon at maturity. A shape-shifting flower (would I recognise ‘Hera’ from a mature specimen only?), which brings to mind Zeus rather than his missus, the Olympian queen of the gods.
