Proteas Designed with a Spring-Ready Twist

In springtime proteas abound, which makes them easy to include in your everyday decor. Among the season’s most beloved proteas are pincushions and banksia with warm color palettes in lively hues of orange, yellow and green.

For this spring protea arrangement, I mixed bold, hardy Leucopsermum Flame Giant + Brandi dela Cruz and Banksia Speciosa with some roses, alstroemeria, yarrow and eucalyptus. And, for a playful touch, I added a delicate stem of foxglove. The results made for a vibrant centerpiece with a tropical-feel and put a spring-ready twist on the proteas. The sherbet color palette added a sense of softness that resonates with springtime and the new beginnings.

Materials

• Leucospermum ‘pincushion’ Flame Giant and Brandi dela Cruz 
• Banksia Speciosa 
• Orange roses 
• Purple yarrow 
• Alstroemeria 
• Foxglove 
• Eucalyptus Baby Blue 
• Eucalyptus Blue Gum 
• Round ceramic container 
• Clippers 
• Waterproof floral tape

Steps

1. Create a tape grid across the top of your vase using waterproof floral tape. 
2. Begin designing your arrangement by creating a base of the eucalyptus Blue Gum foliage. 
3. Continue to build the base by adding the Leucospermum and Banksia. 
4. Once you have a nice base and shape, insert the roses. Make sure to cut the stems at an angle to allow maximum water absorption. 
5. Next, insert the alstroemeria and yarrow stems randomly around the arrangement. 
6. Add color and a new texture with the mint green eucalyptus Baby Blue. 
7. For the final touch, use a stem of foxglove to bridge the color palette of the arrangement. Keep the stem long so that the bell-shaped flowers perch up over the arrangement.

Flowers truly feed the soul!

Bright & Cheerful: High Gold

Yellow flowers will always be chic. You can count on a sunny bloom to elevate your mood thanks to the color's bright and cheery appeal. The lively hue is often linked with sunshine, warmth, and happiness… emotions that are all worth relishing. Beyond yellow’s symbolic meaning, it's important to remember how versatile it is when picking out flowers. Matching yellow blooms with other flowers and foliage is easy, especially because the shade blends well with most others.

If you're creating a spring design and want a color scheme that represents the season, you might want to select a yellow Leucospermum, like High Gold. A spring fave here on the farm that delivers a cheerful pop of vivid yellow blooms beautifully displayed on long, straight stems, now through May.

High Gold is statement-making not only due to its color but its awesome texture too, so you can work in just a small brust of color with a few well-placed blooms. Take this centerpiece, for example. The High Gold, as seen here, do not need to be the focal point to make a statement. The vibrant color has that covered, without monopolizing the whole arrangement.

Whether you prefer to mix a variety of colors throughout your design or you're a fan of a monochromatic, you shouldn't underestimate how brightly High Gold can shine.

Fabulous Foliage: Leucadendron Inca Gold

We cheerfully braved the ‘chilly’ start to winter knowing the promise of colorful Leucadendron was on the way… and we’re delighted to say the Inca Gold’s bright yellow bracts have emerged right on time. Fields bursting with this vibrant flowering foliage is the best part about the dawn of winter.

Inca Gold's rich yellow tulip shaped bracts can liven up any space instantly. With just a handful of stems, you can easily bring a burst of sunshine indoors and enjoy the soothing energy of nature. Yellow advances from surrounding colors and enlarges any space. It mimics a sun-filled space, creating feelings of liveliness and optimism. In the natural world, yellow is the color of sunflowers and daffodils, bananas and lemons, bees, numerous birds as well as several of our favorite Leucadendron The many facets of this vivid yellow hue reveal its extremely impactful spirit.

To celebrate the advent of Inca Gold, we’re sharing some of our favorite designs using this fabulous foliage.

10 Yellow Inspired Protea Designs

Hello Yellow… Pantone has spoken! The color of the year is always a fun headline to look forward to every January. According to Leatrice Eiseman, Executive Director of the Pantone Color Institute, "The hue of yellow, called Illuminating (one of two colors selected for 2021), will help to fill people with energy, clarity and hope to conquer the continuing uncertainty, spirited and emboldening shades satisfy our quest for vitality. Illuminating is a bright and cheerful yellow sparkling with vivacity, a warming yellow shade imbued with solar power."

Yellow has historically been used to kindle joy and inspired positivity. Plus, nature is where color begins, after all... and no color is more a representative of nature than bright yellow. In the natural world, yellow is the color of sunflowers and daffodils, bananas and lemons, bees, numerous birds and many of our favorite Leucospermum and Leucadendron. In nearly every culture on earth, yellow represents sunshine, happiness, and warmth.

Looking through our collection of yellow floral creations, we have several examples where we have used yellow as the principal color in each design.

There is no doubt yellow sparks a broad spectrum of emotions in all of us. While it can be playful and radiant, it can also be unforgiving and ominous, which makes it a wildly fascinating hue. The many facets of the color yellow reveal its extremely impactful spirit.

Leucadendron Inca Gold

Looking for a winter pick-me-up? With one step into a field of Inca Gold, you can escape to a ‘botanical retreat’ filled with rays of golden sunshine, leaving the winter blues behind. Yes, Leucadendron, please! Who doesn’t love a burst of sunshine on a cold, dreary day? This popular cultivar (which is absolutely stunning during this time of the year) is believed to be a hybrid of L. laureolum and L. salignum yellow. The rich buttery-yellow flowering bracts (think Illuminating) with red tips do not open wide like many Leucadendrons as they tend to keep a closed tulip-like shape.

There’s no doubt the color yellow sparks a broad spectrum of emotions in all of us. While it can be playful and radiant, yellow can also be unforgiving and ominous, which makes it a wildly fascinating hue.

The many facets of the color yellow reveal its extremely impactful spirit.

Yellow can liven up any space instantly. It is, perhaps, one of the easiest ways to bring sunshine indoors and enjoy the soothing energy of nature while relaxing in your home. Yellow advances from surrounding colors and enlarges any space. It mimics a sun-filled space, creating feelings of liveliness and good cheer.

2021 Colors of the Year: Ultimate Gray & Illuminating

It's an annual announcement: Come early December we all eagerly wait for the experts at Pantone to release the Color of the Year, forecasting a shade that they believe will set the tone for the year ahead.

This year, the global color authority and provider of professional color language standards, Pantone, has selected "Ultimate Gray" and "Illuminating" for colors of the year 2021 (yes, two colors). In an official press release, Leatrice Eiseman, Executive Director of the Pantone Color Institute, states, “The selection of two independent colors highlight how different elements come together to express a message of strength and hopefulness that is both enduring and uplifting, conveying the idea that it’s not about one color or one person, it’s about more than one. Practical and rock solid but at the same time warming and optimistic, this is a color combination that gives us resilience and hope.”

Pantone emphasized that a hue of yellow, called Illuminating, will help to fill people with "energy, clarity and hope" to conquer the continuing uncertainty, spirited and emboldening shades satisfy our quest for vitality.

"Illuminating is a bright and cheerful yellow sparkling with vivacity, a warming yellow shade imbued with solar power."

On the other hand, Ultimate Gray evokes feelings based on solid and dependable elements which are everlasting and provide a firm foundation.

Ultimate Gray is also the color of pebbles on the beach and found on natural elements whose "weathered appearance highlights an ability to stand the test of time."

"Ultimate Gray quietly assures, encouraging feelings of composure, steadiness and resilience," added the company.

When it comes to flowers and foliage which are appreciated for their immense color selection, symbolic meanings + overall “happy” nature, Pantone’s color selection is perfect. Yellow has historically been used to kindle joy and inspired positivity. Here’s just a few of our floral faves to look for in 2021.

Leucospermum High Gold

Leucadendron Inca Gold

Leucadendron Pisa

Leucadendron Gold Strike

Isopogon

Grevillea Moonlight

Eucalyptus Tetragona

Leucadendron Galpinii

Whether Ultimate Gray and Illuminating are used as a pair or independently, these versatile colors will hopefully inspire creative ways of thinking and help move us forward with the optimism for a better tomorrow.

Mellow Yellow

There’s no doubt the color yellow sparks a broad spectrum of emotions in all of us. While it can be playful and radiant, yellow can also be unforgiving and ominous, which makes it a wildly fascinating hue. The many facets of the color yellow reveal its extremely impactful spirit.

Yellow flowers and foliage can liven up any space instantly. It is, perhaps, one of the easiest ways to bring sunshine indoors and enjoy the soothing energy of nature while relaxing in your home. Yellow advances from surrounding colors and enlarges any space. It mimics a sun-filled space, creating feelings of liveliness and good cheer.

Some of my favorite yellow flowers are the Leucospermum High Gold and Leucadendron Pisa, they are bright and cheerful and mix nicely with most other colors. For this arrangement, I mixed the High Gold and Pisa with Grevillea flowers, Solanum rantonnetii, yellow genista, roses, Leucadendron Gold Strike, eucalyptus, loquat branches and even some interesting twigs from my garden.

Where the Leucospermum Grow

Fields of leucospermum or more commonly called “pincushions” sway in the breeze blowing through the hills, creating a vibrant welcome mat for those who venture up into Rainbow Crest. These vibrant red, orange, peach, yellow and bi-colored flowering heads are formed mainly with long, sprout-like structures that end in a globular knob called a pollen presenter. Together, the mass of styles look a lot like pins bristling from a “pincushion”, a similarity that has given rise to the popular name for this genus.

Leucospermum comprises some forty-eight species, of which all but three are endemic to South Africa’s Cape Province. Flowering time is generally winter through late spring. Unlike flowers of the genus Protea, which rely on their showy bracts for visual appeal, leucospermum put all their art into the colors of the flowers themselves as well as the flowing shape of each curving component. These fanciful blooms atop sturdy stems create colorful focal points not only in the field but when displayed in floral designs.