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Bouquets of Suntory's exclusive blue rose
“Roses are red, violets are blue, this silly love poem is no longer true,” one could now cajole their lover as they hand them a bouquet of the world’s first lovely true blue roses bought in one of Japan’s major cities. Famous Japanese beverage manufacture, Suntory Holdings, has announced that it will start selling a nearly 100% blue pigmented, genetically engineered rose through its subsidiary Suntory Flowers.
Rose breeders have bred the highly prized flower into a number of color shades through out the centuries, but blue had remained elusive, according to Suntory’s press release. This is because roses lack a natural blue pigment called Delphinidin, found in such plants as violets.
Creating the blue rose
Suntory says they started seeking to create the supposedly “impossible blue roses” in 1990 using biotechnology. They finally achieved success in 2004 with the help of their Australian subsidiary Florigene by combining a rose with the blue pigment genes from pansies. In 2008 they got approval from the Ministry of the Environment to produce and sell the flower. The last year has been spent setting up production and distribution systems.
The same technique has also been used by Suntory to produce a blue chrysanthemum which Suntory announced in the middle of last month. Chrysanthemums also naturally lack the same blue pigment as roses.
The blue rose is being called the SUNTORY blue rose APPLAUSE – applause for achieving a wonderful accomplishment. Suntory says the blue rose characteristically has a “blue hue like the sky at dawn” and has a “colorful and freshly elegant fragrance.”
Blue roses for sale
The flowers will go on sale for 2,000-3,000 yen ($22-33 USD) on November 3rd (which is the Japanese national holiday Culture Day) at a limited number of shops in the Tokyo, Nagoya, and Kansai areas of Japan. Internet sales will also reportedly begin shortly. There is no word yet on international sales.
One can only wonder what the famous poet Rudyard Kipling might say now in his poem Blue Rose:
SUNTORY blue rose APPLAUSE
“Roses red and roses white
Plucked I for my love's delight.
She would none of all my posies--
Bade me gather her blue roses.
Half the world I wandered through,
Seeking where such flowers grew.
Half the world unto my quest
Answered me with laugh and jest.
Home I came at wintertide,
But my silly love had died
Seeking with her latest breath
Roses from the arms of Death.
It may be beyond the grave
She shall find what she would have.
Mine was but an idle quest--
Roses white and red are best!”
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