Flowers make a wonderful gift for those celebrating essential milestones in their lives. These beautiful botanicals can lift your mood and increase your cheer. You could also pick up a bouquet for yourself for no particular reason at all but to enjoy them in your home. After you have purchased your flowers, you will want them to last for as long as possible in the vase. Therefore, three varieties of flowers make outstanding contributions to cut-flower arrangements because of their long life once cut.

1. Zinnias

Zinnias rank as one of the best choices for cut flowers. These popular annuals come in a wide variety of colors so that you can find those that best blend into the floral arrangement that you select. Professional florists, like boston flower shop Boston MA and others, can offer guidance in selecting cut flowers that look wonderful and will retain their beauty over time. Moreover, the zinnia flower varieties come in several different petal shapes. For example, Giant Cactus zinnias have rounded, tube-like petals that radiate from the round central pistil. On the other hand, Whirlygig zinnias offer flat round flower heads with solid blocks of different colors up the petal lengths, forming concentric circles of bright colors.

2. Carnations

As herbaceous perennial plants, carnations provide fluffy, double-petaled round-shaped flowers on silvery-green stems that last a long time as cut flowers. Their colors range from white to pinks and reds, and some cultivated varieties now offer new flower colors such as green, blue and striped.

3. Chrysthanthemums

When you look for a bright, warm-colored flower for a cut arrangement, you will often find chrysanthemums filling the bill. The petals, most typically in shades of yellow and orange, flow out from the central pistil and appear in many layers, creating a dome-shaped flower of great beauty.

Using these three long-lasting cut flower selections as the backbone of the complete flower arrangement you select, you can help ensure that the floral bouquet will grace your home with lingering elegance for many days.