Pinks are Dianthus. The name belongs to a genus of plants and not to a color, and dianthus garden pinks are only one branch of it. Sweet William sits under that same name, and so does the carnation that older gardeners call the clove pink. That is why a pure white bloom on a nursery bench can still be a pink.
Clove comes off the clump of garden pinks at the front edge of my own border before I am close enough to see a petal. Warm, sweet, a spice rack more than a rose. I planted that clump for the flowers and kept it for the smell. The carnation in the same genus answers to the name clove pink, and one pass along the path tells you why.
What are pinks flowers, then? A genus, not a shade. Dianthus is a Greek name, and any plant that carries it counts as a pink, whether the petals open pink, white or deep red. The pink in a pink petal comes from anthocyanins, and pelargonidin is the pink one in that pigment family. The genus name came out of Greek, and it covers every plant in the group whatever the florist trade puts on the bucket. Roses build those same pigments. Nobody calls a rose a pink.
The mix-up is easy to make, and you see it every time somebody sorts a florist bucket by color. A bunch of pinks does turn up pink most of the time, and the word pulls double duty in English as a color word, so the two meanings blur together. Gardeners kept the older meaning, and you will hear it in any nursery. When a plant person says pinks, they mean the name on the label, and the ones in their own border may well be white or red.
Dianthus garden pinks, sweet William and the carnation cover most of what the group holds, and all three sit under Dianthus in a plant catalog. Read the second word on the tag and you can sort them out without looking at a single flower.
Garden Pinks
- Botanical group: Dianthus, the same genus that holds the carnation and sweet William, so the tag and the common name agree.
- Listed as: A perennial entry of its own in plant catalogs, kept separate from the carnation and from sweet William.
- Tag names: Cupcakes Blush and Raspberry Cream both turn up on plant tags, and neither name tells you the species.
Sweet William Dianthus barbatus
- Botanical name: Dianthus barbatus, which puts it in the genus even though the common name says nothing about pinks.
- Common name: Sweet William on every label, a garden name that carries no color with it at all.
- Sold as: Both a garden plant and a florist flower, under the one name in both places.
Carnation, the Clove Pink
- Botanical name: Dianthus caryophyllus, the species behind the flower you buy by the stem.
- Older name: Clove pink, used for the very same plant long before the florist trade settled on carnation.
- Sold as: A cut flower first, which is why plenty of people never place it in this group.
Catalogs file dianthus garden pinks with the garden perennials rather than the florist flowers, so the two ends of the genus seldom sit side by side in one shop. Selection names lean sweet. Cupcakes Blush and Raspberry Cream read like a dessert menu, and a name like that never tells you the genus. Sweet William (Dianthus barbatus) is the one that works both counters.
Sweet William is the name that hides the link best. Nothing in it points at pinks or at Dianthus, so shoppers file it away as its own thing and skim past the catalog line that gives the species. It belongs in the group all the same. Same genus, different species, and the tag says so in the second word.
Turn the tag over and look for Dianthus before you look at the flower. The genus name settles whether you are holding a pink, and the color of the bloom tells you nothing at all about that.
Buy by the botanical name and let the color go. If the label reads Dianthus, the plant is a pink, and the petals can open white or red without changing that fact. Ask a florist for the clove pink carnation and you get Dianthus caryophyllus, the same genus as the low mound by your front path.
Read the full article: 10 Pink Flowers and What Makes Them Pink
