'CANDY BASKET'
The Williamson-White Medal is restricted to miniature tall bearded (MTB) irises. It is named in honor of E. B. Williamson (1877-1933), his daughter Mary Williamson (1909-1987) and Alice White (1886-1969). Although others had introduced irises that fit into the miniature tall bearded iris class before Williamson, he and his daughter were the first to breed them as cultivars in a distinctive class of irises. They were apparently byproducts of breeding for tall bearded irises. In the early 1950s, Alice White of Hemet, California began a crusade to gain recognition for the assets of these wonderful smaller irises. She organized table iris robins and wrote many articles for the AIS Bulletin and gardening magazines promoting their virtues.
Previous awards winners can be found at https://wiki.irises.org/Main/InfoAwards.
 |
| Miniature tall bearded iris 'CANDY BASKET' photo by Jeanette Graham |
'Candy Basket' (Chad Harris, R. 2015) Seedling 08MTB1. MTB, 22" (56 cm), Very early bloom. Standards warm caramel (RHS 166B), slight violet cast; style arms honey mustard-tan (163C); falls off white ground heavily veined black cherry-red (187A), faint golden rim; beards bright lemon-yellow (13A); slight spicy fragrance. 'Redrock Princess' X . 'Butterscotch Wine'. Pleasant 2016.. Introduced by Mount Pleasant Iris Farm in 2016.
The World of Irises blog will be posting classification medal winners as soon as the hybridizers are notified. The entire list of winners, including Award of Merit and Honorable Mention, will be published on the AIS website, the AIS Encyclopedia, and later in the AIS Bulletin, IRISES.
