Square stems and a habit of spreading
Mint (Mentha) is easy to spot even before you smell it. Roll a stem between your fingers and it feels square, and the leaves grow in opposite pairs with toothed edges and a crinkled, deeply veined surface. Those traits mark the whole mint family, Lamiaceae, which also includes basil, rosemary, sage, thyme and lavender. The two mints in most kitchens are spearmint, with brighter, pointed leaves and a sweeter flavor, and peppermint, a hybrid of spearmint and water mint with darker leaves and more menthol. Mint spreads fast through underground runners, so gardeners often grow it in a pot to keep it from taking over a bed. In mid to late summer it sends up small spikes of pale lilac or white flowers that bees visit.
Ten sprigs, from young tip to flowering stem
Each image is a single sprig with no pot, jar or glass. The set includes a spearmint sprig with pointed toothed leaves (01), a sprig with a pair of crinkled leaves (02), a peppermint sprig with darker veined leaves (03), a single upright stem of paired leaves (04), a tender sprig with small top leaves (05), a bushy sprig with several leaf pairs (06), a stem topped with a small spike of tiny pale flowers (07), a young sprig with bright fresh leaves (08), a sprig with broad rounded crinkled leaves (09) and a long stem with evenly spaced leaves (10). The short sprigs read as a garnish, the long stems as a cutting from the garden.
Cocktail menus, tea labels and Derby Day
Mint is the herb most tied to drinks. Use these sprigs on cocktail menus for mojitos, on mint julep invitations for a Kentucky Derby party on the first Saturday in May, on iced-tea and lemonade stand signs, and on Moroccan mint tea or herbal tea blend labels. Cooks can put a sprig on recipe cards for tabbouleh, mint sauce, chocolate-mint desserts or fruit salads. Soap and lip-balm makers often use peppermint (03) on product labels. Wedding planners use mint for the pun on favor tags reading mint to be, often tied to a tin of mints. Garden centers and herb growers can use the flowering stem (07) on plant tags.
Fresh greens with the rest of the herb garden
The palette is cool, bright green: pistachio and avocado in the light leaves, jade and hunter green in the shadows and veins. On-page thread matches include DMC 369 Pistachio Green Vy Lt, 471 Avocado Grn V Lt and 3346 Hunter Green. For an herb-garden layout, combine mint with its family members basil, rosemary and thyme. The full set of kitchen herbs is in the herbs hub, and leafy sprigs for wreaths and borders are in the greenery hub. Bright mint green pairs well with lime and lemon yellows, white, and soft pink for a summer drinks menu.
Plant markers that survive the garden
Each PNG is 2048x2048 pixels on a transparent background, about 6.8 inches square at 300 DPI. For herb pot markers, print a sprig about 1.5 inches tall on waterproof vinyl sticker paper, add the herb name below, and stick it to a wooden or plastic stake; a laminating sheet over plain paper also holds up outdoors for a season. For a seed-packet front, the flowering stem (07) or the bushy sprig (06) fills a narrow vertical layout. On drink menus, a sprig tilted at an angle beside each cocktail name works better than a full row of upright stems.