7 steps to care for your Valentine Roses

Have you have been surprised this Valentine’s with one of my gorgeous bespoke bouquets of roses? I hope you felt truly spoilt when we delivered them and adore your fresh blooms from your local florist. Here at Town Garden my team love being involved on such a special day and helping our lovely customers share some true romance! I carefully source the finest roses to use for Valentine's Day - velvet texture, softly scented, high petal count and rich colour are what I look for, as this means the very best quality and luxury look.

Here are 7 easy steps to help keep your Valentine roses looking beautiful for even longer.

Step 1 - New home

Time to prepare the new home for your romantic roses!

• Find a decent size vase or container for your flowers. For roses, I recommend using a tall and slim vase, as this helps support the long stems and beautifully displays the rose heads.
• Give the vase a good rinse with warm soapy water to remove any bacteria
• Fill the vase half way full of room temperature water
• Add the flower food provided by Town Garden to the water, this is full of nourishing ingredients to help feed the roses.

Step 2 - Carefully Unwrap

As soon as possible, carefully remove any protective wrap and string that may be around the flowers. Don’t forget to find the hand-written card with the personal message from your Valentine that will be nestled in your flowers!

Many of my bouquets are delivered with little or no gift wrapping to help cut down on the amount used, or I use recyclable paper and sundries wherever possible.

Step 3 - Snip Snip Snip

Using a pair of sharp scissors, carefully snip 2-3cm from the bottom of each stem at a 45 degree angle - this gives the stem base a larger surface area to absorb much needed water.

Next, hold the stem up against the vase and remove any leaves or foliage on the stem that will fall below the waterline. This helps stop the foliage sitting in the water which causes it to decompose and nasty bacteria forming.

Some people like to remove the thorns on roses too – but I prefer to leave them on, as removing them can damage the stems menaing the rose doesn't last as well.

Step 4 - Remove guard petals

Roses will often have guard petals on arrival – don’t worry these are completely normal and are left on to protect the delicate petals during the journey. These guard petals can easily be removed once you are ready to arrange your roses in the vase, just gently pinch and peel the guard petal off the flower. This will then reveal the beautiful rose petals full of vibrant colour underneath!

How to spot a guard petal: these outer petals aren’t quite as colourful, and can look brown, crinkly or dry.

Step 5 Time to arrange

This is my favourite part - time to arrange your roses in the vase or container! Place stem by stem to build up your design, roses always look fabulous when arranged diagonally (so the stems criss cross at the bottom) and displays the rose heads close together. Then add any foliage round the outside so leaves gently fall over the side of the vase, which gives a stylish and relaxed look to the arrangement.

Step 6 – Display and enjoy

Find the perfect spot at home to display your gorgeous new roses and enjoy looking at them. I would love to see your Valentine roses and hear the love stories behind them so feel free to take a photo and tag Town Garden in on Instagram!

To help keep your roses happy and healthy for as long as possible, I recommend:

• Keep out of strong direct sunlight
• Away from chilly drafts or extreme temperature changes such as conservatories
• Avoid heat sources such as log fires and radiators

Step 7 - Give a little love

To keep your roses looking lovely for longer, there are a couple of easy maintenance things you can do; change the water if it starts looking cloudy, top up the water level if its running low, remove any dead or wilting leaves along the way.

Love from ...

I hope you absolutely adore your Valentine Roses from Town Garden and had a fabulous Valentine’s Day (even in lockdown!). If you have any flower questions for my team then please give our Hitchin shop a call or drop us an email – we love a chat!