THE TULIP COLOR BOX 
T HE difference between the hesitant amateur 
and the finished creator of garden pictures is 
generally the same difference that separates 
the beginner in painting from the accepted art¬ 
ist. They both use the same color box. They have 
the same catalog of tints and tones to choose 
from. Between failure and success lies a knowl¬ 
edge of some simple principles in color arrange¬ 
ment. 
Just what, then, must we know before we 
make colorful pictures with tulips? Apart from 
the color descriptions contained in this catalog 
after each variety, what few other things must 
we reckon with? 
Backgrounds and Environments 
Many a tulip flowers to blush unseen be¬ 
cause it lacks a background or a suitable envi¬ 
ronment. Shrubbery or walls may form the 
background or it may be merely adjacent 
foliage. From the vast range of spring flowering 
shrubs, one cannot make a mistake in selecting 
these for backgrounds. Visualize a shoal of pink 
"Rosabella," “Princess Mary" or "Venus," under 
the lee of a massed planting of the beautiful 
lilac, "Miss Willmott"; or "Mrs. Moon" and 
"Arethusa," lying like a patch of the starry 
heavens under the purple pendants of a wis¬ 
taria, or the cherry-red of "Barbara Pratt," near 
the pure white flowers of spirea. The spread of 
peony-leafage or the feather spikes of polemo- 
nium or the broad leaves of anchusa, these may 
create a contrasting environment for Breeder, 
Cottage, and Darwin tulips. Or it may be that the 
flowers of herbaceous plants that bloom simul¬ 
taneously with the tulip, will help create the 
necessary harmonious or contrasting environ¬ 
ment—the great variations of tall bearded irises, 
the low blue of spring veronica and the scorch¬ 
ing orange of Siberian wallflower. Visualize the 
bronze-violet of "Roi Soleil," the mauve-pink of 
"King Mauve" and the white of "Glacier" with 
the blue flowers of Phlox divaricata var. 
Laphami. Or this same tulip combination with 
Mertensia virginica. 
But not alone is the background and environ¬ 
ment made on an upper plane; much depends 
on what lies below the tulips—the ground cover 
and the low plants blooming immediately there¬ 
abouts. From the simplest contrasts to the 
subtlest combinations the selection can be 
made. With blue aubretia, for example, the 
contrasting orange of "Golden Age" and the 
lemon of "Moonlight"; with white arabis or iberis, 
"King George V"; with violets or myosotis, the 
deep yellow of "Mr. Wentholt," or the chestnutty 
"Goldfinch," or "Madame Buyssens," or "Jane 
Aldred" or the orange-yellow of "Jeanne Desor" 
or even the pointed spires of "Avis Kennicott." 
Color Harmonies 
Like the animals that walked into the ark two 
by two "after their kind," so must tulips be 
combined "after their kind" if we are to succeed 
with them as picture material. Varieties of deli¬ 
cate coloring and structure should be kept apart 
from those of brilliant, insistent coloring and 
robust structure. 
Dark colored varieties are used for the main 
bold rear or front color effect. Interplant these 
with contrasting colors or different tones of the 
main planting. It is well-nigh axiomatic that 
background colors should be strikingly darker 
or lighter than the foreground colors. Thus 
"La Tulipe Noire" and "Zulu," or "Louis XIV" 
and “Bacchus" can be used for a mass of dark 
tones; "Aviator Hawks"—an old rose—"Zwa- 
nenburg" or "Inglescombe Yellow," or light 
bronze varieties will afford contrasts. Another 
contrasting combination would be the purple 
maroon "Faust" and the yellow of "Retroflexa 
Superba." Or the black maroon "Zulu" with soft 
pinks such as "La Fiancee" and "Flamingo." Or 
the apricot-colored "John Ruskin" and "Ambro¬ 
sia" with purples and crimsons. 
When tulips are used in the perennial border, 
there should be no sharp dividing line between 
the colors. They should be planted in irregular 
shoals or drifts that run one into the other, so 
that as an observer walks along the border the 
color aspect is constantly changing. On the 
other hand, continuity should be maintained by 
planting a few bulbs of the same tones all 
through the border so that they connect the 
various drifts. 
"Zwanenburg" and the silvery pink of "Aphro¬ 
dite" close by a shoal of pure pink "Leda", the 
rose-pink "Princess Mary," then some of the 
"Aphrodite" and the "Leda" can be extended 
beyond the shoals to connect them. This echoing 
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