Caring for your Heart Beat

A few small rituals keep these blooms looking their best for longer.

A note on your specific blooms

  • Heliconia — Keep it warm; Heliconia bruises and blackens below 12°C, so never refrigerate or sit it in a cold draught.
  • Allium — Change the water often and keep it fresh, as Allium stems can release a faint onion odour into the vase.
  • Peony — Cut the stems on an angle and use cool, fresh water, as warmth forces the heavy blooms open too quickly.
  • Ranunculus — Cut the hollow stems straight across, not at an angle, and keep water shallow and fresh, as these stems sit soft and bruise or rot easily when submerged too deep.
  • Gladiolus — Trim the stem and pinch off the topmost faded buds to push the remaining florets up the spike into bloom.
  • Amaranthus — Recut the stems at an angle and keep the water shallow, as amaranthus drinks heavily and the lower stem softens quickly when submerged too deep.
  • Scabiosa — Its slender stems are thirsty and bend easily, so keep the vase well topped up and give them a clean diagonal recut every few days.
  • Eryngium — Trim stems at an angle and keep the water shallow and clean, as Eryngium dislikes sitting deep and lasts longest in a cool spot.
  • Ammi — Trim stems on a sharp angle, strip any foliage below the waterline, and refresh the water often, as Ammi drinks heavily and its fine leaves cloud the water quickly.

How long your flowers last

With the right care — a fresh trim, clean water every couple of days, and a spot away from heat and direct sun — your arrangement stays beautiful for several days. Because every stem is conditioned and hydrated in our Dubai atelier before it travels, it arrives at the very start of its life.

The story behind these flowers

A closer look at the blooms gathered into this arrangement.

Heliconia

Origin

Tropical Americas (a few species Pacific/Indonesia)

Named

By Linnaeus in 1771

Fragrance

Virtually scentless

Symbolises

Boldness, return & exotic beauty

Linnaeus named the genus after Mount Helicon, home of the Greek muses, and the flower lives up to the billing. What reads as a bloom is a fan of waxy bracts, lacquered in scarlet, gold and pink, that lends an Amicis arrangement clean tropical architecture and lines that hold from across a room.

Allium

Origin

Central Asia, the Mediterranean and the temperate Northern Hemisphere

Cultivated since

Ornamental use spread through Europe from the 1800s

Fragrance

Faintly oniony, otherwise clean

Symbolises

Unity, patience & strength

A member of the onion family, the Allium opens into a perfect sphere of tiny star-shaped florets held high on a bare stem. That clean geometry brings rhythm and altitude to an arrangement, drawing the eye upward and lending structure to softer, rounder blooms around it.

Peony

Origin

China

Cultivated since

Over 2,000 years in China

Fragrance

Sweet, soft and rosy

Symbolises

Prosperity, romance & honour

Cultivated in China for more than two thousand years, the peony was crowned the King of Flowers and favoured by emperors long before it reached a Western garden. Its tight bud opens into a deep, ruffled bloom that brings volume and quiet drama to an arrangement – a single stem is often enough.

Ranunculus

Origin

Eastern Mediterranean and southwest Asia

Reached Europe

In the 1500s, via Ottoman gardeners

Fragrance

Faint to virtually none

Symbolises

Charm, radiance & allure

Each bloom holds dozens of tissue-thin petals layered into a near-perfect sphere, a structure that opens slowly from a tight bud into something almost rose-like. That gradual unfurling makes Ranunculus a quiet anchor in an Amicis arrangement - sculptural when closed, generous and full once it relaxes open.

Gladiolus

Origin

Southern Africa

In European gardens since

the 1700s–1800s

Fragrance

Lightly sweet to virtually scentless

Symbolises

Strength, integrity & remembrance

Named for the Latin gladius, or sword, after its tall, blade-like leaves. Each stem then stacks funnel-shaped blooms that open from the base upward, and that vertical line gives an Amicis arrangement its height and architecture, drawing the eye skyward where rounded flowers would settle flat.

Amaranthus

Origin

Tropical Americas (Andes & Mesoamerica)

Cultivated since

For thousands of years by Andean & Mesoamerican peoples

Fragrance

Virtually scentless

Symbolises

Immortality, unfading love & endurance

Grown across the Americas for millennia as both grain and ornament, amaranthus is best known for its long crimson tassels that spill downward in soft, trailing ropes. Its name comes from the Greek for unfading, a nod to blooms that hold colour and form even as they dry. In an arrangement it adds movement and weight, draping over the edge of a vessel to break a clean silhouette and lend an Amicis piece an unhurried, sculptural fall.

Scabiosa

Origin

Mediterranean and Eurasia

Cultivated since

In European gardens for centuries

Fragrance

Soft and honeyed

Symbolises

Pure love, sympathy & remembrance

Named for its old herbal use against skin ailments, Scabiosa is better known today as the pincushion flower, for the fine protruding florets that stud its domed centre like pinheads. On slender, wiry stems it brings airy movement and a quiet textural detail that lifts an Amicis arrangement beyond its focal blooms.

Eryngium

Origin

Coastal and temperate Europe and the Mediterranean, with kin across the Americas

Prized since

Antiquity; a celebrated European confection from the 16th–18th centuries

Fragrance

Virtually scentless

Symbolises

Structure, attraction & independence

Often called sea holly, Eryngium answers to the steel-blue clusters and spiny collars that hold their colour even when dried. In an Amicis arrangement it works as architecture rather than bloom, lending edge and metallic depth that sharpens softer roses and peonies around it.

Ammi

Origin

Nile Valley and the wider Mediterranean basin

Grown since

Known since antiquity, valued as a cut flower in modern floristry

Fragrance

All but scentless; a faint green note rises from the crushed foliage

Symbolises

Delicacy, elegance & airy lightness

A relative of the carrot, Ammi opens in wide lace-like umbels of tiny white flowers on slender stems. In an arrangement it works as a veil rather than a focal point, softening the edges around roses or peonies and lending Amicis bouquets an unstudied, garden-gathered ease.