I bought my first book on perennial garden about twenty years ago and it had a 'Bowl of Beauty' peony on the cover. I've wanted one of these ever since. They were hard to come by back then, and when I first started seeing them in garden centres, they were about three times the price of the other peonies.
Last spring I treated myself to one, however it must have been mislabelled because it was a different peony.
I tried again this year and purchased this plant just about a month ago. It is already blooming (a lovely surprize, as sometimes peonies can take a few years to get established) and it is definitely a 'Bowl of Beauty'.
This is the one that was labelled 'Bowl of Beauty' at the garden centre. You can notice that the outer pink petals are the same shade of pink as the one above. It's a double (rather than the single 'Bowl of Beauty') and has a very slightly paler shade of pink in the centre.
