Mordialloc Florist: 2012

The rainbow rose, nasty or nice? With requests on rainbow roses I thought I may enlighten people that there is no such rose naturally grown with each petal being a different colour.

The rainbow rose is a rose which has had its petals artificially coloured.

The method exploits the rose's natural processes by which water is drawn up the stem. By splitting the stem and dipping each part in a different colored water, the colors are drawn into the petals resulting in a multicoloured rose.

Besides roses, other cut flowers like the chrysanthemum, carnation, hydrangea and some species of orchids can also be coloured using the same method.

The uncomplicated process has been known for more than a millennium. Several companies have moved to patent the process. It appears they have been partially successful. It will be up to the courts to decide if the process can be patented. In 2005 the Dutch grower Peter van de Werken succeeded in using this uncomplicated process with a special color combination, using a rose, in a way that the outcome showed as a Rainbow Rose. The result was worldwide presented as Breaking News. Since then Peter van de Werken is well known as the inventor of the Rainbow Rose.

A lot of research was done to find the best cultivar for this unique coloring process, with the result that the Vendela Rose is the only cultivar that absorbs all the different colorants perfectly. The Vendela Rose is a Hybrid Tea, cream rose that grows in the Netherlands, Colombia and Ecuador. When the rose is in full bloom it has a flower diameter of 6 cm and a stem length of 40 to 100 cm. The rose isn’t scented.

Other cultivars that can be used for this coloring process are Rosa La Belle and Rosa Avalanche+. However these cultivars rainbow are not as bright as Vendela.

The Original Rainbow Rose has the 7 colours of the rainbow and this is the most popular rose in this category. However there are also the tropical variant with combinations of red/pink and yellow, and the ocean variant with combinations of green and blue. Other colour combinations are also possible, though black and white are impossible to make.

This technique is not practiced or found in Australia easily. It is something we at Mordialloc Florist say is "against our flower religion." They are not seen as classy and also the vase life is not long. However, if you are willing to experiment be our guest, and we can order you in some gorgeous flowers for you to play with.