Most Beautiful Types of Tulips

Tulip Divisions

• Horticulturists group and discuss the hundreds of tulip varieties in 15 divisions. The divisions are defined by common flower characteristics such as flowering time, flower shape, petal number or genetics. The division names are single early, double early, triumph, Darwin hybrid, single late, lily-flowered, fringed, Viridiflora, Rembrandt, parrot, double late, Kaufmanniana, Fosteriana, Gregii and miscellaneous. The most unusual or visually ornate tulips tend to accumulate in the double, lily-flowered, fringed, parrot and Rembrandt divisions.

Double Tulips

• Double tulips are those that display flowers with extra petals-- more than the usual six petals -- to create fully plump blossoms. The various double tulip cultivars are placed in the double early or double late divisions. Double-flowered tulips resemble the look of cup- or bowl-shaped camellia or peony flowers. Names of some double tulip cultivars include Abba, Carnaval de Nice, Gerbrand Kieft, Mount Tacoma, Monte Carlo, Orange Nassau, Peach Blossom, Viking, Schnoonoord and Angelique.

Lily-Flowering Tulips

• Regardless of the color of lily-flowering tulips, it's the gracefully, curvaceous shape of the flower that makes them beautiful compared to other tulips. The flower buds are upright and elongated, and once the petals open, their pointy tips curve backward slightly to create a goblet or curving funnel-shaped bloom. Examples of this type of tulip are Aladdin, Ballerina, Marilyn, Mariette, Queen of Sheba and West Point. Most lily-flowered tulips bloom later in spring.

Fringed Tulips

• Fringed tulips are cup-shaped with only six petals, but the petal edges are minutely jagged or seemingly etched in hairs, making the flower look delicate and edged in crystal shards or feathers. Often the petal is one color and the fringed edges are a contrasting color. Fringed tulips tend to bloom later in spring. Cultivars of fringed tulips include Bird of Paradise, Burns, Blue Heron, Estella Rijnveld, Fringed Beauty and Hamilton.

Parrot Tulips

• The six petals extant in a parrot tulip are irregularly shaped and curved, often with partially fringed edges. The colors are a blend of green veins with smears of other colors, mimicking plumage of a parrot with wings and feathers twisted and fluffed. Destiny, Flaming Parrot, Orange Favorite, Red Parrot, Texas Gold and White Parrot exemplify this group of ornate, beautiful tulips.

Rembrandt Tulips

• Rembrandt tulips are rarely grown and sold commercially today, but the smears, streaks, speckles and mottlings of multiple colors on the flower petals look like a haphazard mess of a painter's palette board. During the Tulipomania craze in Europe in the 16th century, it was these widely colored tulips that fetched such high market prices. The strange color patterns are actually caused by a virus, and is one reason these tulips are not commercially grown nowadays, since they could ruin modern tulip selections. Rembrandt tulips are sometimes referred to as "broken" tulips. They are not sold individually as cultivars, but usually as an ambiguous bulb mix.

Single Tulips

• A gardener may prefer the simple, solid colored, cup-shaped tulips to be the most beautiful. Many bicolored single-tulip cultivars exist, too, and can be quite attractive, especially if the petal is one color and the petal edges are banded in a contrasting color. Boldly colored examples of bicolored single tulips are Shirley, Keizerskroon, Union Jack and Leen van der Mark.