Children's Day in Hamburg

Children's Day flowers: small bouquets and a safe composition

On Children's Day — 1 June in a long list of countries — the flowers usually do not go to a child at all. They go to a mother, a nursery teacher, a class teacher, an organiser; the child gets a balloon, a toy or something sweet. Worth knowing before you choose.

When the bouquet genuinely is for a child, it is built by different rules than an adult one.

Sized to the child, not the budget

A child has to be able to hold it. Adult proportions are too heavy, long stems drag along the ground and dense wrapping unbalances the whole thing.

Five to seven short stems, or a small basket with a handle. The basket wins: it is carried like a bucket, it does not come apart and it can be put down anywhere.

Safety

Anything sharp, staining or strongly scented comes out of a child's bouquet:

• lilies, whose pollen leaves marks on clothing that do not wash out
• roses with thorns, unless the stems have been stripped
• florist's wire and pointed decorative elements
• small loose parts in the wrapping, if a younger sibling is around.

Gerberas, thornless spray roses, chrysanthemum, alstroemeria and chamomile all work. They are bright, robust and survive being carried around a garden for an afternoon.

Colour

This is the one bouquet where more is more. Yellow, orange, magenta, blue, all at once — the register an adult would find excessive is exactly right here. Pastels read to children as something belonging to grown-ups.

Balloons instead

For a child below school age a balloon almost always beats a bouquet: it moves, it can be carried alone and it outlasts the attention span. A small bouquet plus a balloon covers both the adult handover and the child's part of it.

Groups and classes

Bouquets for a group or a class should be identical. Visibly different gifts invite comparison among children, which is the opposite of the point. Multi-item orders like this are easier to place two or three days ahead.

Delivery

The first of June is a public holiday in many countries, so most addresses are residential. Book the delivery in Hamburg for the first half of the day: children's parties start early and by evening there is nobody left to hand a bouquet to.