Human Flower Project
Orrington, MAINE USA
Murrieta, CALIFORNIA USA
Princeton, MAINE USA
Saturday, October 09, 2004
Lords and Ladies Ride the Irish Mail
Ireland has issued a new set of stamps featuring the lowly dandilion and the snazzy Lords and Ladies lily, Arum maculatum, pictured below.
Noted botanical illustrator Susan Sex has painted six Irish wildflower stamps. All you Irish readers and travelers, please send mail!
The new issue includes a mix of the island’s rarities and roadside weeds (more flatteringly described as “flowers of the hedgerow”): Dog – violet, Dandelion, Primrose, Hawthorn, Bluebell, Lords and ladies. A poetic press release from the An Post explains, “Ireland has a relatively mild and moist climate, making it possible to grow a wider range of garden plants than in most places in the temperate world. These native wild flowers consist of those that have grown here since before Ireland was separated from the European landmass after the last ice age and those that are capable of long distance dispersal and which arrived here in the winds.”
Since flower people tend to focus on uncommon species, take note of “lords and ladies,” which one source claimed is Ireland’s “only native lily.” Starch produced from the plant’s tubers was used both as cosmetic powder and as a stiffener for those dandy Elizabethan collars.