Flowers for Saint Paul, MN

Order a bouquet for a nurse coming off shift at Regions on Jackson Street, or for a grandmother in one of the Victorians along Summit Avenue, and the thing that decides whether it arrives fresh is which shop takes the ticket. Saint Paul is a city of distinct halves and hills — the brick warehouses of Lowertown and Union Depot down by the river, the Cathedral looking over West Seventh, the college blocks where Snelling crosses Summit, the long residential grid of the East Side out past Payne and Phalen, and Highland Park tucked against the Mississippi bluffs. A florist who works those streets every day reads an address and already knows the parking, the buzzer, the visiting-hour rules. A national warehouse boxing stems for a courier does not, and it shows up in the flowers.

Other Minnesota cities.