Joseph’s Mantle
[V] What's This?

Tom Craig, 1948/1948
Iris Class:
Bearded
Bearded Class:
Tall Bearded
Age:
1940-1949
Fall Color:
Yellow Ground Any Stitch
Standard Color:
Yellow ground Any Stitch
Pattern:
Luminata
Beard Color:
Orange/Deep Yellow
Hybridizer:
Craig
Rarity:
GG eligible - protected

Full Description

TB 36″ EM

From Cooley’s Gardens catalog for 1952: “Immense flowers, flaring and somewhat ruffled. Golden buff lightly washed and striated red-brown, with red-brown stippling forming and almost solid ¼-inch margin to the falls. One of Craig’s many new fancy and unusual plicatas.”

From “The Court of Iris 1955″  M 36″ $2.50 (China Maid X Tiffany) X (Mitchell Sdlg : ([((Seduction) X ([(Mitchell Sdlg. #1-115) X ((Sherbet X Yel
B I) X (Alcazar X Esplendido)]) X (Bronze Beacon X San Francisco))])
What a pedigree-but also WHAT a flower! One of our great favorites and one which always attracts attention. It is as difficult to describe this ‘fancy plicata’ as to give its parentage. The buff-gold has striations of red-brown and seems to have been brushed over with ivory-white on the veins in the falls. Its a beauty and I don’t know why it doesn’t have a string of awards as long as its pedigree. Blooms at various times of the year.”

From M. Oliver Flower Farms catalog for 1957: “As colorful as its name, the fancy work is done on a ground of cream beige and is brushed on in shades of mulberry red. A persistent bloomer.”

From Lloyd Austin’s Rainbow Gardens catalog for 1958: “A delightful frequent bloomer from Tom Craig. He tells me this blooms with early iris, again with late ones, still again in October or even mid-winter in mild climates. Often it blooms as heavily in October as does any Iris in spring. So colorful was named for ‘Joseph’s coat of many colors’. An immense flower in golden buff washed and striated red brown, with red brown stippling forming a margin to the falls. Tom Craig is an artist of renown. This creation makes one wonder if he has found a secret way of coloring his hybrids as he applies colors to his canvas. Joseph’s Mantle will amaze and captivate you.”

(China Maid x Tiffany) X (Mitchell Sdlg.: ((((Seduction) x (((Mit. #1-115) x ((Sherbert x YB1.) x (Alcazar x Esplendido))) x Bronze Beacon x San Francisco)))).

Provenance: Image 2 from Presby Memorial Iris Gardens, Montclair NJ,  2004.