Chalice

I don’t find the flowers all that interesting or unusual and there were only about a dozen on my 8 year old plant in 2020.  It is fairly easy to obtain so obviously others are more excited about it than I am. Saunders himself called it “a corker” and “a great beauty” in his notebook! It was one of the first hybrids he introduced and it was a new form so that may have influenced his comments. Would he have been as excited about it in 1950?

Be sure to give it some room.

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Cultivar: Chalice
Year: 1929
Seedling No: 1578. Page 58 of Saunders’ Notebook I
Parentage: 4: lactiflora ‘Primavere’ X macrophylla

 

Flower: Color: very light pink, fades to pure white
Form: single, large (7-8″) flowers, 8 petals
Blooms: Week 4
Carpels: generally 2, light colored (grey?), woolly
Stigmas: dark red
Disc: white (Silvia Saunders’ notes)
Stamens: filaments red at base, shading to yellow
Plant: Habit: somewhat spreading
Foliage color: medium green, conspicuous red stems
Foliage form: large leaves showing macrophylla heritage, not lobed
Height: 36″ (reported) but mine is 23″ in 2022 and 40″ wide

 

Recommendation: Collectors’ plant
Availability: Several specialty nurseries