Occasions in Berlin

Occasions in Berlin: from a golden wedding to a teacher's Saturday

Silver and golden wedding anniversaries have been kept in the German lands since the sixteenth century, long before English-speaking countries added paper, wood and tin anniversaries in the nineteenth. Occasions in Berlin each carry their own date and their own rule about colour, and that decides the bouquet before the flower itself does.

Silver at 25, gold at 50: wedding anniversary flowers in Berlin

A silver wedding marks twenty-five years together, a golden wedding fifty, and both have held a place in the German calendar since the sixteenth century, well before English-speaking countries built their ladder of paper, wood and tin anniversaries onto the earlier years. Berlin keeps separate wedding anniversary and golden wedding subsections for that reason.

August brings the most weddings across Germany, with May and June close behind and January the quietest month of all, so a twenty-fifth or fiftieth anniversary in Berlin lands more often in late summer than in midwinter. A bouquet for the day reads better with colour in it than in plain white: eleven white and pink roses let the pink carry that colour, so the gift doesn't drift toward a sympathy arrangement by accident. A bouquet of raspberry-pink roses beside white hyacinths does the same job where roses alone aren't the style, keeping the eye on colour rather than on any one bloom.

At sunset on Potsdamer Platz a man hands a woman a bouquet of raspberry-pink roses and white hyacinths, glass towers behind them — Raspberry-pink roses beside white hyacinths keep an anniversary bouquet in colour rather than all white.

Good Friday to the second Sunday of May: spring occasions

Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays in Berlin, so an Easter bouquet usually arrives while the family is at home rather than at work; Ascension Day and Whit Monday later in the spring are holidays too. Muttertag falls on the second Sunday of May and isn't itself a day off, and since shops stay closed on Sundays by law, florists run shortened hours around it rather than their usual ones.

Berlin also keeps 8 March as a public holiday, and together with Mother's Day it brings far more orders than an ordinary week. The practical answer is to book Easter flowers or a Mother's Day bouquet a few days ahead rather than wait for the morning itself, since the shortened Sunday hours leave less room to fix a mistake.

A courier walks down a quiet Berlin street of tenement houses on a sunny spring day, carrying an armful of tulips in front of him, cherry trees in bloom and a yellow tram in the distance — Tulips and cherry blossom belong to the weeks between Easter and Muttertag.

A Saturday before the first lesson: flowers for a Berlin teacher

Einschulung, the start of primary school, is marked on a Saturday at the end of summer, two days before the first real lesson, and most schools set the celebration between nine and eleven in the morning. The child goes home with a Schultüte, the cardboard cone packed with sweets and small gifts, while the class teacher goes home with flowers from the parents.

Because the celebration has a fixed morning rather than a loose weekend, flowers for the teacher are best ordered for that Saturday, with the date and the hour set in advance rather than left open.

A new baby, new keys, a promotion: news that calls for colour

A new baby or a colleague's retirement in a Berlin office often starts with a whip-round across the whole department before anyone thinks about flowers, so the bouquet that follows is usually a joint gift rather than one person's choice. A promotion among those everyday occasions in Berlin is different: flowers suit it especially well, with no whip-round needed first.

An all-white bouquet of lilies, calla, hydrangea or chrysanthemum reads as mourning to some recipients. For a new baby or a new flat, it helps to add a second colour alongside the white, the way the Lily and Gerbera Bouquet keeps gerbera next to the lily rather than leaving the vase entirely pale. Office congratulations for a promotion or a work anniversary can stay brighter still, since nobody reads orange or yellow as condolence.

A kraft-wrapped bouquet lies on a white table beside a blank cream envelope and an open pastry box with cupcakes; a drop of water and a frayed ribbon end on the tabletop — A blank envelope waits for the few words that turn a bouquet into congratulations.

Sympathy flowers and the Sunday before Advent

Totensonntag, the last Sunday before the first Sunday of Advent in late November, is the Protestant day of remembrance, when families visit graves, lay wreaths and Gestecke and light candles rather than exchange gifts. It stands apart from the birthday-and-anniversary occasions in Berlin covered above, and the flowers chosen for it carry that quieter purpose.

White chrysanthemums in particular carry a graveside association in Germany. For sympathy, white can work; for a birthday or a new baby, it can send the wrong message.

Whatever the date, occasion flower delivery in Berlin follows the same routine: the florist photographs the finished bouquet before the courier leaves, the card can carry a name or stay blank, and most orders reach the recipient the day they were placed. A thank-you, an apology or a quiet thinking-of-you bouquet needs none of the dates above, only a reason. For a first order, Mother's Day already has its date fixed, while a ward or a hotel room is worth mentioning before the flowers are chosen, since the address decides what can actually be delivered there.