Immortality

I'm not a big fan of frilly bearded irises in circus colors. I'm not a fan of grape soda colored flowers. But this is what has opened in my garden this week:

What I wanted and what I planted was a totally white bearded iris called 'Immortality', named that because it reliably blooms in spring and then comes back to flower again in late summer.

I had it in my Connecticut garden and loved its crystalline white elegance. It looked like sugar. The pristine white of its petals calmed the ruffled ostentation of an iris, and it did re-bloom well for me. Here is 'Immortality' in my old garden, looking like clouds floating.

But of course . . . OF COURSE . .  what I ordered and paid for is not what they shipped me. Mismarked plants have been the bane of my new gardens here. Once again, not what I wanted.

I had my heart set on a stand of brilliant white set against the deep green background of the wall of Virginia creeper vine. A scarlet red pot with a cool blue grass is a bit of added punctuation.

I shouldn't be so fussy. It's enough of a challenge to have any kind of garden in this climate, and irises like our dry conditions. So who cares if it's not what I ordered, it's growing nicely and it's tall and flowery.

Years ago on a visit to the Missouri Botanical Garden in May, I saw huge fields of irises in every color and combo and it was riotously spectacular. Lots of grape purple in there.

In that kind of massed planting the wild color mix made sense and the effect was bold. But I wanted white. Pure white. I wanted elegance, not showy excess. I wanted the twice a year re-bloom.  

A week after the purple iris opened, a second iris in the group bloomed, and it is in fact white. Maybe only one bulb in the order was an error.

I'm going to dig up and remove that purple bulb. It's actually casting a pinkish glow on the white iris, as the late sun hits the purple flower just out of the frame of the picture, making its neighbor rosy hued. 

It's messing with Immortality . . and the universe can't have that, can it?

UPDATE:

I moved the purple iris and now Immortality shines by itself:

Right after I moved it, a hailstorm moved through -- the fourth one this spring. But it only lasted a few moments, the hailstones were small, and the iris is no worse for it.