Flowers for McMinnville, TN

McMinnville has a nickname that does most of the introducing: the Nursery Capital of the World. Warren County's soil and climate at the foot of the Cumberland Plateau grow field after field of shade trees and ornamental shrubs shipped to landscapers across the country, and the industry has shaped the town's whole relationship with growing things. Cut-flower design is its own separate trade, though, and the everyday orders here look like any Middle Tennessee county seat: anniversary roses for houses along the Barren Fork River, senior-night bouquets carried to Warren County High, get-well baskets run over to Ascension Saint Thomas River Park on Sparta Street, thank-you arrangements for the plant floors at Bridgestone and Yorozu that keep the local paychecks moving. Set against the plateau, with Rock Island State Park and Fall Creek Falls drawing weekend traffic out the two-lanes, it is a town that both grows plants for a living and still needs somebody to hand-tie a dozen roses by two o'clock.

Other Tennessee cities.