Flowers for Staunton, VA

Staunton earned its Queen City nickname the old-fashioned way, as the commercial hub of the central Shenandoah Valley, and its Victorian downtown still sets the pace. Beverley Street and the restored Wharf district near the old rail depot pull most of the retail and event orders; from there the town climbs into the Gospel Hill and Newtown historic neighborhoods, past the American Shakespeare Center's Blackfriars Playhouse and up toward Gypsy Hill Park. A florist here isn't fighting traffic so much as reading the recipient's block — the tight brick streets around Mary Baldwin University, the ridge homes above the park, or the flatter grid out toward the interstate. Get-well and sympathy work anchors the week, much of it routed to Augusta Health over in Fishersville, with birthdays and campus deliveries filling the rest.

Other Virginia cities.