How to Grow, Harvest, and Dry Statice Flowers

Pale purple statice flowers in garden bed with a swallowtail butterfly in a flower.
‘Twilight Lavender’ statice flowers with a swallowtail butterfly. Statice flowers attract a wide variety of pollinators.

(Limonium sinuatum) Annual statice

Home » Grow Statice for Colorful Fresh and Dried Flowers

Statice is very often used in floral arrangements. It comes in a wide array of colors, dries beautifully and retains its color well. Its stems are well-branched making it a fantastic bouquet filler by mixing in through all the flowers. And because it dries beautifully, it can be used in many ways in dried florals.

Statice is super easy to grow in your home garden. It’s very productive, giving you loads of fresh flowers and plenty to dry for dried florals.

It’s generally planted as an annual. But if your winters are fairly mild, statice may go through the winter easily. That gives you a head start on the flowering season, too. Which simplifies life.

It’s native to the dry areas of the Mediterranean making it a moderate to low water user (once it’s established).

And wow, these flowers attract and feed so many pollinators: bees of all kinds, butterflies, hummingbirds, and skippers!

This page is about annual statice, L. sinuatum, but there are several other statice tyoep in the floral trade, most of which are perennial. Those are good for fresh and dried use as well.  Read about the most commonly used perennial statice types here.

Statice flowers and plants

A single stem of rosy colored statice flower on a young statice plant.
A young ‘Roselight’ statice plant shows the flat foliage of a young plant.

The plants form a low rosette of leaves. The flower stems rise up to about a foot tall, or more, with a main rib with thin leafy structures flaring out from them. The stems culminate in well-branched flower heads.

The flowers are about a quarter inch wide, made up of a papery calyx with a little white flower in the center. It’s the papery calyxes that have the nice colors and the texture to dry well.

For a low-growing plant, statice produces a lot of flowers.

When dried, the calyx remains and the white flower disappears or gets tiny. And the calyx maintains that beautiful, intense color!

Statice grows from seed quickly. It takes up to four months to flower from transplanting.

Generally planted as an annual, if you’re  winters are fairly mild, statice can become a perennial. In my area, USDA Zone 8, most of them go through the winter easily, which simplifies life!

How to grow statice flowers

Annual; Full Sun; Water: regular ( allow soil to dry out somewhat between waterings once established)

Statice seeds are easy to start. Sow about 1/8 in. deep in spring. Keep warm. Sowing early in seeding cells is recommended. I especially like the styrofoam ones (they’re durable and last long) because they provide good insulation. They germinate quickly but flowering can be up to 4 months, so start them early if you need your flowers early. If they overwinter where you are, they’ll produce a lot of flowers early in the next spring.

Space them about a foot apart in the garden. Plant in good garden soil.

How to harvest statice flowers

Harvesting flowers will encourage more stems to grow.

Cut them when the almost all the papery bracts are open. Cut at the bottom of the stem. Use basic post-harvest handling if you’re using them fresh or dried.

For dried flowers, gather them into small bunches and hang upside down in a cool, dry, darkish place.

How to work with the dried flowers

The statice flowers shatter easily when they’re dry, especially during very dry weather. This can make it difficult to craft with them.

So plan to craft with them, as in making dried floral wreaths, when the stems are about half way dry and the flower heads are stiff yet still pliable. Sometimes you’ll end up with some underdeveloped flower heads on the outer edge of the flower head. These can be cut off. But keep in mind the stems will shrink further when they’re completely dry so they may become loose in a wreath or other arrangement.

If your flowers are very dry, you can rehydrate them in damp weather by keeping them in a cardboard box or even laying them out in a sheltered place to let them rehydrate. Give them a few days, and try to plan your crafting around damp weather events.

Also, please note: when dried statice can lose its color when exposed to too much sunlight. As do many dried flowers, with the exception of strawflowers. So try to put your dried creations away from sunlight. They’re stems will age to brown over time also. But, if cared for well, you can expect many years of lasting beauty.

Favorite varieties

There are many different colors to choose from. To me the absolute best are:

White, or Iceberg, is always good and full looking. It’s a great bouquet filler, and good for wreath making.
American Beauty is a bright rosy-red color. I love this one, especially in dried florals because it’s so bright and cheery. But it produces best in the first flush of flowers only, not later in the summer. It’s stems are thin and wiry. But it adds a nice punch of color to dried florals.
Twilight Lavender is my favorite of the purples. It’s a light, bluey purple but it has a full flower array and abundant long stems
Apricot Shades is a mix of apricot to pale rose, in soft, subtle shades. They’re wonderful for fall Roselight is a pretty, light rose color.

Here are the other most available statice colors:

Midnight Blue, a dark blue, but I never like how it performs. It often doesn’t open up all the way, and doesn’t produce many stems
Royal Purple is another whose performance I never liked. There other purples available like Seeker purple from Johnny’s Seeds.
Yellow, or Gold Coast, in shades of yellow.
Heavenly Blue is a clear, sky blue.

You’ll often see seeds with QIS in the name which means Quality in Seeds in the floral industry for consistent production in quality, length, and uniformity.

Sources for statice seeds

Pinetree Garden Seeds: This company has all my favorite colors, they sell them in their individuals colors, and they’re priced exceptionally well. This is my go-to for statice seeds.

Johnny’s Seeds: They have a nice selection of colors and two mixes.

Urban Farmer: All their statice are QIS seeds.

Special info on statice flowers

When I grew a lot of statice, too much really, because it’s so easy to do, a lot of them would go to seed. The next spring, volunteers came up in a really nice range of colors! The color I liked most was a nice ivory. It was much softer than the white and mixed with well with other flowers. And was very nice in my wreaths. It’s something to try for! If statice overwinters for you.

Heart shaped wreath with white, blue, and purple statice and other dried flowers.
Heart shaped wreath made with ‘Twilight Lavender’, purple, and white statice with safflower, red gomphrena, and greens and pods.
Wreath made with purple, pale lavender, white, and yellow statice plus dried green ferns.
Wreath made with purple, pale lavender, white, and yellow statice plus dried green ferns.

Flowers to go with statice

Crested rose-colored celosia flower heads

Celosias

Colorful, fast-growing, unusual, annual flowers, perfect fresh and for drying.

Bright Rose Strawflower

Strawflowers

These brilliant flowers are perfect for fresh bouquets and dried florals.

Orange safflowers on plant

Safflower

Add bright orange flowers to your bouquets and dried And it’s easy to grow.

2 orange Gomphrena flowers on the plant

Gomphrena

An easy-to-grow annual flower in a wide variety of colors is excellent fresh and dried.

Spiky blue ball flower is Echinops

Globe Thistle

This perennial flower gives gorgeous blue spiky flowers you can use fresh or dried.

Rounded green poppy pods on their stems

Breadseed Poppies

Add silvery foliage to your fresh and dried bouquets and wreaths.

Helpful gardening tips

Red handled clippers, blades open

Best Clippers

These are the very best clippers to use for all your pruning and clipping needs, and definitely for harvesting your cut flowers.

Healthy green perennial plant with a shovel in soil to dig it up.

Transplanting Perennials

How to transplant the flowers you invested time, money, and effort in to get the best success for your nest garden.

Metal tines of a digging fork

Digging Fork

A good digging fork is the most valuable tool for your garden. It makes work much easier. It’s better for the soil, too! Read why and what I recommend here.


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Many green statice flower stems in a garden bed, some with purple flowers.
A bed of statice plants starting to flower, first with purples. This bed was about 15 ft. long and 4 ft. wide. The plants were spaced a foot apart. That makes about 60 plants. It was enough for many fresh bouquets, fresh mixed bouquets, dried statice bouquets, and many wreaths. You may only need 5- 10 plants for a very good supply for your home supply.