Peony Registry

Received April 16, 2020. Parentage: ‘Madame Furtado’ x ‘Catharina Fontijn’. First bloomed 2014, first propagated 2019. SEMI-DOUBLE. Late season bloom. Normally 1 bloom per stem. Flowers 6 inches in size (15 cm). Basal portions of petals are pink (RHS: 56A) becoming lighter and fading to white at the tips. Petal edges are rather evenly lacinated, forming a uniformally frilly flower. Five carpels, chartreuse yellow (RHS: 4A (+,-)), smooth. Stigmas red, with normal anatomy. Pollen-bearing stamens, filaments yellow. Fertile. Staminodal disc is red and well developed. Fragrant. Self-supporting upright growth habit, height to 28 inches (72 cm). Named (with permission) for Marie-Nicole Lemieux, a Canadian-born coloratura contralto (Order of Canada (2015), l’Ordre national du Québec (2013)). Since her debut, winning first prize at the Queen Elisabeth International Music Competition in Belgium in 2000, she has become known as one of the finest coloratura contraltos performing on the world’s stages today. Admired for an unusually flexible and beautiful contralto voice, as well as for its richness, warmth and resonance, all of it combined with stage presence and communicative power. The flower’s lacy form and delicate coloring give it an eighteenth century feel, evocative of the era during which the Baroque operas, the characters of which she performs so well, were composed.