Roses Are Red... And Yellow and Pink, Too!

Flowers and hearts, red and pink and purple, arrangements romantic and playful, fun and elegant - is filled with this and more.

There are five people working in the store on Saturday, and three have already left.  Bethany Seidel, 43, the owner, says the store is planning on being open on Sunday, though it's usually closed.

Practically everywhere you look, you see flowers and vases, arrangements finished and tagged, arrangements being made, vases waiting to be filled.

And yet, this is not the florist's busiest day.

"Mother's Day is busier," says Wayne McLean, the store's floral designer. "Everyone has a mother."

McLean is a master designer with more than 25 years experience. He worked for decades around Boston, and has been at Mohegan Flowers & Gifts on Norwich New London Turnpike for about four years.

The day of the week on which Valentine's Day falls makes a difference in the volume, McLean says. On a weekend, you can take your love out to dinner or a show much more easily than on a weekday, he says. A mid-week Valentine's Day is busier for the florists.

Today, McLean says, Valentine's Day itself, "is the day from hell."

"Everybody wants their flowers first thing in the morning," he says. And of course, everyone can't be first. But as flowers begin to arrive at businesses, and sweethearts begin calling their sweethearts, telling them who in the office received flowers, the calls start coming in to hurry!

"We deliver to businesses first, and homes afterwards," he says. 

Red roses in various arrangements are the most typical Valentine's Day flowers, but McLean says they might not truly be the best.

"Valentine's Day has been kind of stereotyped," he says. "Guys have been led to believe that red roses are the roses of love, and the only rose for Valentine's. But most women prefer a colored rose."

Yellow, he says, is what many women's prefer, followed by pink.

McLean shows how to tell whether a rose is fresh: Gently press the bottom of the flower, near where it joins the stem. If it is dense and hard between your thumb and finger, it is fresh. If it's soft there, it's not.

Mohegan Flowers & Gifts will deliver any arrangement starting at $35, and sometimes will deliver a less-expensive one, as well. It has all sorts of arrangements available, from roses to chrysanthemums to candy-striped boxes filled with daisies and other pretty flowers.

These days, McLean says, FTD arrangements often involve a product (a vase that looks like a Hershey kiss, for instance) or a celebrity. Right now, the Faith Hill collection is popular.

But you can give the designer leeway, McLean says, and let him use his creativity. 

"When you order flowers," he says, "you get a better arrangement if you leave it to the designer." 

He has one customer whose significant other's favorite color is purple. That customer calls the florist and says, just do it. And voila, a big, gorgeous, purple arrangement that comes from McLean's imagination and experience.

His favorite kind of arranging is what he calls "high style." These arrangements are generally more stark than regular arrangements. They are more spare, relying less on quantify and more on quality and placement.

"There's tension in those arrangements, and release in those arrangements," he says. "You're really selling air."