As you could already guess, I’m really deep into vintage drawings of flowers, herbs, and fruits. Today I picked a 17th century watercolor of a beautiful variegated tulip.

It was drawn at the time of the so-called Tulip mania, when tulip bulbs were more expensive that gold itself, and the species from the original image, Semper Augustus, was the most expensive of all. Its exotic mosaic color, that is a result of Tulip breaking virus, made it a piece of luxury for medieval merchants, thus the price was growing rapidly. The tulip economic bubble bursted in 1637, but still lives in painting and books of the period.

Vintage tulip (Semper Augustus) cross stitch chart

Stitch count: 122 x 248 stitches, 22 colors

! Download Vintage tulip cross stitch chart

Did you know? Though tulip mania is the most famous of flower crazes, there were also a hyacinth mania in early 19th century and a Orchidelirium in Victorian era.