Masonic Funeral Flowers

Recently we had a request for a Masonic compass and square funeral arrangement. I have to say in my almost 20 years of doing flowers, I've never been asked to do a Masonic lodge arrangement. I was, however, aware of them and that there are styrofoam forms for these items - the compass & square, a broken wheel for the Rotary, Kiwanis symbols, etc. But this stuff, or set pieces as we call them, is very old school and not widely done any more.

I haven't been doing this long enough to see some of the really old school designs - but I've heard the tales of pieces like the "Gates of Heaven" or "Pearly Gates" which were large freestanding designs of gates completely made out of flowers or the "Empty Chair", a chair all covered in flowers. I'd love to get my hands of some photos of old funeral work, so if you have any links, please share!

Over the past couple of decades, the amount of flowers going to funerals in general has diminished dramatically. Part of this has to do with the rise of donations as an option for celebrating someone's life, but some of it has to do with a great reduction in the number of hours for wakes. When I started out, the typical funeral had 3 sets of calling hours - 2-4, 7-9, and 2-4 again the next day. Over time that became 2 sets of hours on one day, and then one set of hours, usually 5-8 or 4-7 o'clock.

Now, a lot of the wakes we see have calling hours for just one hour immediately preceding the funeral service. With the hours for viewing so limited, a lot of folks don't see the point of flowers for such a short time.

I can tell you though, that going to a wake or service that has no flowers can be a little cold. Flowers continue to bring comfort, even if not on the same scale as "back in the day".

Back to our Masonic flowers! I can tell you, I had quite a time securing a compass and square form! None of my vendors had one in stock. I knew I could make one if I had to, but this would add a lot of time to an already busy day.

After a couple calls to a few flower shops that have been in business forever, I finally found one who had a couple of these in their basement - whew!

My client requested blue and white and mentioned carnations. The old school way to do a piece like this would have been to cover the form in carnations, but we wanted to keep the clients requests in mind while updating the look. So I covered the form with black ti leaves and variegated New Zealand flax leaves and placed it in arrangement of blue and white flowers (including carnations!).

I think we succeeded, what do you think? Would you want flowers this specific and symbolic for you or your family?

Prom Flowers 2010

Besides the amazing bling of this crystal corsage wristlet and ring, we are also carrying these sweet Sterling silver 2010 charms that you can add to your prom flowers! Only $5 to add a lasting keepsake. :-D

Cocktail Party Flowers!

I know, I know, I have been totally slacking on the blog. I hope you all have been following on Facebook and Twitter, as that seems to be where I've been spending my limited time lately. More about my limited time later...

But for now - 2 fabulous cocktail party arrangements! The first one in cream and gold is "Something Bubbly".

And these cranberry toned flowers are "Cosmopolitan" - naturally! Just the thing for a birthday soiree, right?!

Monster Flower!

I don't think it will eat you...

Just have to share a quick pic I took at the Boston Flower Exchange yesterday. I have never seen a flower this large before, have you?! It's some kind of heliconia...I know it had the word Madagascar in the name, but I didn't have pen and paper handy to write it down.

Do you see the little orange blobby thing just under the rim of the bucket? That's a pin cushion protea - I put that there to give you some idea of the scale of this monster!

Speaking of scales - wish I had picked it up, I wonder how heavy it is. I can't even begin to think how I'd use this in a design!

Mardi Gras Party Flowers

Couple quick shots here of an arrangement that my assistant, Francoise, did for a Mardi Gras party last week.

Funny delivery story - so I carefully packed the flowers in a milk crate, our standard thing for safely transporting something this size. I get to the party location, pull the milk crate towards the car door and unpack most of the stuffing around it so I can lift it out of the crate.

I lift the vase up out of the crate - and there's only half a vase! You see that nice flared pedestal bit at the bottom? Well, I guess the vase was made in 2 pieces and fused together. Or unfused in this case, as I definitely had 2 pieces of vase, and no broken glass.

So I had to quick, repack that guy up, and whiz back to the shop, and put the flowers in another vase. Stuff happens some times. You just have to be ready to act when it does.

Francoise had a fun time painting up these masks which were black to begin with, and I knew we'd find a use for those purple ostrich feathers!

Prom Flower Trends

I've been so busy for the past 3 weeks or so, I've fallen really behind on blogging, but will try to correct that in the next week or so!

I picked up some great new products for the prom season and can't wait to use them! Every year this stuff just gets better and better. There's fabulous rhinestone jewelry, including a necklace that will be amazing with a flower accent and in the wrist corsage category there's an awesome cuff and a spiral arm band.

No granny pantie elastic band wristlets here!

I'm also working on creating Prom Profiles to help you, or help your date, choose the flower accent that best suits your personality and style. I'm hopelessly not cool, but you can help me create the profiles by following the Sprout Facebook page and Sproutflowers Tweets.

Photographing Flowers!

This is a sneak preview look at the photo-stationary-paper-flower collaboration I worked on today! More to follow!

I had the best time!!!!!