Prunus laurocerasus
English Laurel
ROSACEAE, The Rose family
Oh, it took me a long time to figure out what this is. I had no flowers or fruit to key out, and the few people I asked had no clue. It really doesn’t strike me as a Prunus. In fact, I didn’t even know there were any evergreen plants in the rose family. I can’t think of any others right now.
This shrub is very common in Portland. It makes an enormous hedge, growing 15 to 30 feet tall quite quickly. It can be pruned to shape it, but the leaves are so large electric shears leaves it looking quite ragged. Also, it grows so fast formal pruning is high maintenance. Olive-like black fruit follow spires of small white flowers. It is native from southeastern Europe to Iran.
After seeing a neat wreath idea in Martha Stewart, I wanted to try to use these leaves instead of magnolia or bay. I used a grape vine wreath as a form and padded it with shredded newspaper (she uses straw.) Then I laid the leaves flat against the form a row at a time, wrapping floral wire around them as I went, overlapping each row to hide the wire. The I added a bow made of gold patterned wired ribbon.
