Bouquets in Singapore

Bouquets in Singapore: from Mandai's cut orchids to imported stems

Bouquets in Singapore are built from imported stems today, though the island once cut its own flowers for sale. Mandai Orchid Gardens, founded in 1951 for commercial cut orchids, sent dendrobium sprays to Europe, North America and Japan through the 1960s and 70s, and closed at the end of 2010. A florist here buys the stems for an order only after it is paid, so the real choice comes down to who the bouquet is for and where it's going.

After Mandai: the imported stems in a Singapore bouquet

Mandai fed the export trade rather than the local vase, and today's bouquets cannot be assumed to contain orchids. Cut stems are flown in from several places: a quarter from Malaysian Cameron Highlands chrysanthemums and gerberas, another quarter from Chinese and Taiwanese roses, chrysanthemums and lisianthus, and a sixth from Dutch lilies and tulips.

From there, the simplest route is to choose by flower when one particular bloom matters more than the rest of the arrangement. The florist buys the stems only once the order is paid, and if a flower is out of stock, a close match in shade and price takes its place, visible in the photo sent before the courier leaves.

Red for a thank-you or a date, white kept for condolence

For Singapore's Chinese majority, red marks celebration, weddings and good luck, which is why red roses work equally well as a thank-you and as a first-date bouquet. White and yellow chrysanthemums belong to funerals and condolence instead, so a white chrysanthemum has no place at a birthday; a pale, delicate white bouquet meant for a celebration is worth checking against the photo before it's dispatched.

Stem counts of four, fourteen and twenty-four tend to be avoided too, since four sounds like the word for death, and flowers are also a Teachers' Day tradition here.

A bouquet for the living room or for the office desk

Picking bouquets in Singapore comes down largely to the address. More than three-quarters of residents live in an HDB flat, so a classic hand-tied bouquet wrapped in kraft paper is likely heading there, and it goes straight into a vase on arrival.

Where it isn't clear a vase is on hand, a bouquet in a planter sidesteps the question. For the office towers of Raffles Place, Marina Bay and Tanjong Pagar, business bouquets suit a reception desk better than an armful wrapped in paper. Reception rules at a hotel or hospital, and how to keep a bouquet through Singapore's humidity, are covered in the Singapore flowers guide.

Bouquet delivery in Singapore is free within the central zone, and other districts carry a zone charge chosen at checkout. A phone number for the recipient is enough even without an address, and the photo taken before the courier leaves is the moment to flag anything that needs fixing. The time a bouquet takes shows on its own page, and most orders go out on the day they're placed.

Red roses suit both a thank-you and a date, while white and yellow chrysanthemums are kept for condolence. Bouquets sorted by colour is the fastest way into that choice, while a bouquet meant to read as romantic sits under its own heading in romantic bouquets. Whichever one it is, delivery terms covers the zone charge and what the courier needs to find the door.