Ecclectic Zukas Barn Wedding

OK, I l-o-v-e this bouquet! This may be my favorite bouquet of the season so far, so I'm giving you several pictures.

I really enjoyed this subtle but sophisticated color palette of ivory, brown, green, and lavender. There were yummy creamy garden roses which smelled amazing! Also, dendrobium orchids, dahlias, hypericum berries, mini callas, pieris (the stuff that reminds you of lily of the valley), berzelia berries, and these amazing roses with names like 'Blizzard', 'Cool Ocean', 'Amnesia', and 'Quicksand'.

In my next floral life, I want to name flower colors!

I love the movement and bounce that the pieris gave to the bouquet! It's a tricky, expensive little flower (not lily of the valley expensive, but more than you'd expect) that sometimes turns rusty when you least expect it or drops its tiny blossoms all over the place, but so cool if it all works out which it did here. :-)

There was just the one bridesmaid and she carried baby green hydrangeas, green dendrobium orchids, hypericum berries, green echinacea, heleborus, and several of those amazing roses!

This is a good close up showing the garden roses (up top), 'Quicksand' rose (that's the beigey one at the bottom), the pieris (which you might recognize as the shrub andromeda), and right in the center the green echinacea.

Echinacea in green was new to me. I think we're used to seeing it in the pink and referring to it as coneflower.

I don't know if the bride got to walk down the aisle to the gazebo. The weather was very dramatic this weekend with sudden torrential downpours and it came down in buckets as we got back to the shop, just as the bride was to walk down the aisle.

Always be happy with your Plan B if you're doing an outdoor wedding in New England!

Detail of the gazebo flowers - more of all those fabulous, subtle colored roses!

I rarely get to see the bride all dressed up so this was a treat! They did pictures beforehand, which probably turned out to be a good thing with the changeable weather.

You'll notice quite a bit of green stem showing at the base of the bouquet handle. I insist on delivering handtied bouquets in a vase with a smidge of water, and with the unbearable weather we had, these bouquets needed more than a smidge.

And the groom! Let's not forget him, it was his day too! And I took a picture of the happy groom's mom, but she was backlit and it didn't come out - sorry Carol!

Photog getting some farm shots in before the weather got ugly.

I'm sure you're wondering what makes this wedding eclectic, because so far it's been about subtle and sophisticated. Well, keep on scrolling down...

This was a case of the ceremony and reception having two totally different looks. The reception was all about a bright, fun, hot tropical party!

I'll tell you, these centerpieces were a challenge. First off, how do you get a wreath ring to go around the wide wire base of this tree? Well, you get out the sabre saw and cut the wreaths in half, that's how! Bet you didn't know that working with "pretty flowers" also meant using power tools from time to time, did you?

The set up for this event was more involved than most, as we had to wire orchids onto the Zukas Barn's trees in the stifling hot tent, while trying to keep the wreath rings cool in the air conditioned van. Then set up the two halves of the wreaths, and then go back and touch them up with additional foliage and flowers.

The wreath halves were designed to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, so we aimed to keep each half with its mate, but that's not how they wanted to fit in the van! Anyhow, we prepared for the possibility of touch ups by bringing extra flowers and tropical leaves. Francoise and I worked like crazy ladies but hopefully didn't look like crazy ladies!

Although, I think crazy is definitely part of the definition of florist. ;-)

Pink & Green Wachusett Wedding

Everyone loved these bride's maids' bouquets while they were in the cooler and here they are all packed up and ready to go. For some reason the word "fetching" just popped to mind! They feature baby green hydrangea, gerbera, four types of roses, 'Athos' poms, dracena godseffiana foliage (those have the polka dots on them), and green echinacea.

Little clutches of roses for the moms. This look is very popular right now for the mothers as no one wants to pin flowers on their dresses any more and the wrist corsage doesn't work for every look either.

The bride! (As if you couldn't tell!) She wanted mostly white and ivory with just a few light pink spray roses. In addition, there were dahlias, garden roses, hydrangea, more polka dot leaves, and pieris which are the trailing flowers that formed a bit of a cascade.

Altar flowers - it's very important to find out what works in your church's setting. There are so many different churches and what works in one won't work in another. Very few, for instance, allow the flowers right up on the altar table as this one does.

There was just enough time for a quick shot at the Wachusett Village Inn reception. I was dodging tropical summer downpours at every delivery stop and mountain fog, and the inn had me park illegally to make the delivery so I was anxious to get going.

Wishing the bride and groom nothing but sun and blue skies, and hopefully they got a rainbow on their wedding day!

Read Your Wedding Order!

I cannot emphasize this enough - Read your wedding order! From beginning to end. Boring bits and all. Even the stuff you've read before. A flower order is very detailed with all kinds of little bits and pieces going all over the place. I envy the cake person who only has one cake and one stop to make! Our average wedding has 45 - 60 elements with three delivery locations. That's a lot to keep track of.

We have had a few wedding problems recently which would have been avoided, had the clients thoroughly read their wedding orders. Here are a few recent examples.

• Addresses: The address to one bride's house was short one number which made for a really stressful delivery. It was especially stressful since it was one of those country roads that has a cockamamie number system, making it even more unclear where the house was. Was it a typo by me or the bride? Will it matter on your wedding day? What matters is that the flowers get to the right location!

• Directions: If you can't be bothered to give us directions for delivery as spelled out in the contract and we have to rely on Mapquest, don't be shocked if your flowers don't arrive in a timely way. Mapquest had the church on the wrong side of a divided highway which ate up precious time. We got there in plenty of time, but we were lucky.

• Items delivered: Your wedding order should list where each flower item is being delivered. After a recent delivery to the hotel with the bride's, maids', and bride's parents' flowers, a call was received at the church asking for the grandparents' flowers. The order clearly spelled out that the grandparents were to get their flowers at the church and with a tight delivery schedule, there was no way to get back to the hotel in time.

• Wedding party: OK, we only know what you tell us as far as who is in the wedding party. I do prompt people during the consultation to try to cover every possible boutonniere and corsage, but if you don't tell me about your brother who is not a groomsman but will need a flower any how, I won't know. Fortunately there were a couple spare blossoms that we whipped into a boutonniere, but he didn't match the other men in the wedding party.

• Quantities: We need that table count 2 weeks in advance. If you have overestimated the number of tables and I don't hear differently, you might find yourself owning a few more centerpieces than you actually need. If you have underestimated and wait too long to tell us, we may or may not be able to get additional flowers.

If this sounds a bit cranky, it's because we want to do a good job and being hampered by poor, incorrect, or missing information is just darn frustrating. Sure we were able to whip up a boutonniere, but it didn't match and it makes our company look bad if something is incorrect. Your guests don't know where the error lies and it would be natural to assume it was with the vendor. We pride ourselves on getting it right.

Trust me, there are plenty of curve balls and we try to anticipate as many of them as possible, but there are unecessary ones which could be prevented by a thorough reading of the wedding order.

So, READ, REVIEW, READ AGAIN!

Thanks for reading!

Pretty in Pink Wedding - Mechanics Hall

This wedding was all about being a girl; sorry guys! The bride carried a simple round bouquet of creamy whites and light pinks - we have several kinds of roses, dahlias, stephanotis, nerine, and the finishing touch of jasmine.

I never discussed the possibility of jasmine with the bride, as it never even occurred to me to offer it. It's not widely available and frankly I don't even know when it's "jasmine season". But I saw it in the flower market and with its starry white blossoms and delicate pink buds, it seemed like the perfect match for our pink and white bride.

When I presented the bouquet to the bride, I warned her that I had incorporated something we hadn't discussed. I had scissors in hand ready to cut the jasmine out if she said no. No harm, no foul, no hurt feelings. But she smiled and said she loved it! Yay! Yay for taking a chance - both me and her!

Bridesmaids had complimentary bouquets in shades of pink, wrapped with pewter satin ribbon to coordinate with their dresses. I have to say, I liked the pewter fabric of the dresses; it had a crinkly quality. We had hoped to use it to wrap the bouquets, but there just wasn't enough, so ribbon had to suffice.

Detail photo of the maids' bouquet - several shades of pink roses, my fave being "Hot Escimo", pink tweedia, bouvardia, nerine, and true amaryllis variety "Naked Lady". That's the pink lily shaped blossom in the lower right of the bouquet. The large trumpet shaped blooms that grow from bulbs around Christmas that we call amaryllis are really hippeastrum. Confused? Don't worry about it!

Some classic altar flowers - I got to listen to the bride's college choir rehearse while I was setting up the church. I just love choir music! I may have to have a choir rider in my wedding contracts!!!

And then it's on to Mechanics Hall for the reception. This bowl and blossom was the finishing touch on the cocktail tables. I have to say, sometimes I like simple little cocktail things best. I enjoy making them and I don't know, I think a single blossom, or maybe two, forces you to look at the individual flower and appreciate it. The art of some arrangements can lie in the beauty of the blossom and not the designer's touch.

The centerpieces had these amazing pink hydrangeas from the Netherlands! You really almost didn't need any other flowers. :-)

There are still a couple of these hydrangeas kicking around the shop - I may have to take them home, they remind me of cotton candy!

Sprout Gets a New Sign!

Our new shop sign was installed today! I am over the moon with how fabulous is looks!!! This is like the best handbag or new pair of shoes ever! Don't you just love the curly-q in the bracket?! I never would have thought of that, but that's the kind of detail you get in a custom sign such as this one.

I'm kicking myself for not doing it sooner, but I'm terribly slow at these kind of decisions, because, you know, I want it to be - perfect. I know I'll be living with this sign for a long time and I need to love it. And truly, this is the face of Sprout, the front we show the world, the biggest billboard for who we are and what we do! I hope it says that we're fresh and clean and modern and urban. Not your grandmother's flower store.

Many thanks to all for their constructive contributions to the design and thanks to Serrato Sign of Worcester, especially Steve for his patience while I nit picked his great designs, and Andy who harassed me via Bill Randell's blog to stop procrastinating and do it!

Now we await the window graphics, probably next week. Then I'll give you the big picture!

What does your sign say about you?

SLOW ART at Worcester Art Museum

Those of you who know me know I love all things arty from Flora in Winter, Art in Bloom, to Sculptured Blooms, and I especially love all the arty things at the Worcester Art Museum.

Well, my friend in all things arty, Michelle May of Cirque du Noir renown and Pecha Kucha, is hosting an event at the Worcester Art Museum called Slow Art. It's an opportunity for you to join with like minded individuals to stop and really look at art. Yeah, sure, you've looked at art, but did you know on average folks spend 8 seconds looking at an artwork in a museum?

Slow Art wants to challenge you to look for 10 minutes, maybe even an hour, at a piece of art. I know I've rushed through the galleries myself, often trying to get to that one piece I must see. When I prep for Flora in Winter, that's when I really stop and look at a piece. I try to see line, rhythm, balance, color, movement - you know, all that stuff you learned in school!

Slow Art takes place at the Worcester Art Museum (as well as many others around the country, maybe even the world!) on October 17 2009.

To learn more, check out Michelle's blog - don't forget to look at other pages on her site while you're there, for more about inspiration and creativity!

Orange Wedding - Butternut Farm Golf Club

We had a couple weddings this week - both brides with the same name - Emily and Emilie! Talk about a little confusing...but fortunately they were completely different women personality-wise and their flowers were completely different as well with one in orange and one in pink.

Orange first! Boutonnieres were sweet little orange spray roses with a yellow zinnia accent. You all know how much I love zinnias, so these made me happy to no end!

Our bride wanted an all orange bouquet with lighter orange being the dominant shade. Yes, light orange is also known as peach!

We got some phenomenal peach garden roses as well as mokara orchids, gerbera, roses both spray and standard, and dahlias.

Maids were in blue dresses, so brighter orange tones with yellows made for a stunning combo!

One very orange wedding, packed to go!

The tables at Butternut Farm Golf Club in Stow MA, were set with half using centerpieces and half using the venue's cut glass hurricanes with small floral accents.

Lovely pale orangey yellow buttercream cake by Gretchen at Enchanted Wedding Cakes. I'm sure this tastes as good as it looks!

A beautiful sunny day for a beautiful sunny bride (with a few sunny flowers) !

Sculptured Blooms at Art in the Park

So between a zillion wedding deliveries, I pushed the pause button, and took a quick jog around Elm Park to check out Sculptured Blooms. OK, I don't jog, but I was walking very fast, and besides, I had to pass the park 3 times on deliveries! Really, I did. Honest!

Hopefully you had more time than I did and really got to explore and enjoy the flowers and art. I stood still long enough to take a picture and was off to the next one.

The first photo is of a work entitled "Einstein's Onion" by James Kitchen. I have no idea who did the floral piece as when I flew by around noon time, they still hadn't been judged yet, and all the floral designers' names were obscured. I love that they took the "onion" literally - too funny!

This piece is called "Tim-berr" by Joe Fix. Because of the way I cropped this photo, you can't tell that the sculpture is actually wrapped around a tree. Fun primary colors echoed in flowers give a child-like building block feel to the piece.

I did notice a couple hours later, on one of my numerous trips by, that the top half of the floral arrangement was on the ground. Don't know if it was vandalism, or if there were structural issues.

The floral designers were not given any kind of platform for their work, so each designer was going to have to deal with the uneven ground issue on their own. I don't envy them, an uneven surface is always a nightmare. I know people think flowers are all about beauty, but there are many practical considerations too.

It was tough to get decent pictures as some of the works were in bright midday sun or half sun half shade and others were so large in scope it was hard to get everything in one photo. I happen to know the women who made this blue arrangement to go with "Seraph" by Joseph Ferguson, Bev McClure and Kae Collins. Lot of talent there! Wish you could see all the swirly wire details, but again, the sun was too strong.

Yes, those are dyed flowers - orchids and carnations. Blue flowers are typically fragile, so it made a lot of sense to use dyed flowers of sturdy varieties since this was going to bake.

Speaking of baking... Can you say "Toast"?! By Steven Roll Kroeger. And flowers by Arlene Sjosten, another friend in flowers! Talk about outside of the box - a toaster trailer!

The long view down the aisle of "Red Totems" by Sue Champeny leads us to...

...red floral totems by Ken Bositis. I didn't know Ken was participating in this, but happened to run into him there just as I got to his piece! He told me his very expensive (I know he paid a lot, he told me who he got them from...) gladiolas went bad on him so he had to hit the tops of the stems with red paint. Flowers can be unpredictable and uncooperative and some times you have to roll with it and improvise!

I don't know if this was the last piece to be seen, but it was the last one I saw - "Pianista Observatorium" by Michael Frassinelli with flowers by Kathy Michie. This was one of those hard to photograph ones with flowers in shade and sculpture in sun. Kathie used a wooden clothes drying rack and vines to create the structure she put her flowers on, again proving why you can never toss anything - you never know what you'll need for that next great flower arrangement!

I hope folks got out to see Sculptured Blooms, I know it didn't get a lot of publicity. I'm sure the group that put this together would love some feedback when it comes time to decide if they want to do this again.

Yea or Nay on Sculptured Blooms?

Inspiration - Dynamic vs.Static

While in Montreal recently, we had the opportunity to observe and enjoy many different types of public spaces. Now, a month later, looking through the album has me thinking about what it is we did and didn't enjoy and why, and how that relates to other creative endeavors.

This first urban garden has a few not very significant trees and a lot of grasses. How I loved the grasses! I know they're super trendy at the moment, but the soft rustling ssshhhsshh sound against the city hubbub and the touchable textures all make it such an appealing space. There's movement!

We walked through this park several times, took in the rush of water, grassy sitting spots, and shade on a summer day, but it was the meandering curves beneath our feet I think that made this spot enjoyable. It moved the way we moved, unhurried, randomly.

And then we came to this park. I can appreciate the linear, graphic quality of this space, as well as the tribute it pays to the former rail station that it is next to, but it didn't make me or anyone else want to be in it. There was no life there, in spite of all the green. Only one block off the very touristy Old Montreal area, you would think it would be full of weary people resting their feet or looking for a bit of shade, but it was a rather forbidding spot.

The dynamic and the static frequently come up in floral design. We are always making choices that relate to this dichotomy. How does the eye move through the arrangement? Is there a visual "resting" place? Do I want a rigid line or a flowing line? Do I want a line at all? Is the structure the subject matter, or is it just a support? Is there push and pull or stillness?

There is no one always right or always wrong way to use the dynamic and static forces in a flower arrangement, just as in a park, but the thoughtful arrangement will have at least considered them.

Sample Centerpiece - October Wedding

A few quick shots of a sample centerpiece we recently did for a fall wedding, so you won't think this has turned into a gardening blog! I should be getting plenty of wedding action going in the blog soon, as we are booked solid for the next three months, but we just didn't have any going on in July this year.

Just as well, considering how much it rained! Maybe we should bill ourselves as the "good weather florists" (knock wood!)?

Back to flowers - this arrangement needed to be budget friendly and fulfill the bride's oxymoronic request of wildflowers and elegant. Two words that aren't generally put together to describe a wedding; it's usually one or the other.

She was pretty pleased with the sample, so I guess we succeeded!

When working up budget friendly concepts, it pays to be open minded as this couple was. I explained that foliages are one way to give not only visual depth but also size to the arrangement while keeping on track money-wise. That lovely glossy aspidistra leaf on the left costs less than just one of the dahlias and look at how much work it does! It gives you size, weight, and as much or even more visual importance as a flower, or really several flowers. If I removed the leaf and replaced it with one of the golden yarrow of equal cost, would the arrangement still have the same impact? I think not.

Something to consider when you are planning your centerpieces, no?

Greening the Mean Streets of Worcester - Youth Center Garden

If you should find yourself at the Beaver Brook Farmer's Market, make sure you take a peek behind the vendors. If you glance over the weeds, you'll see the Worcester Youth Center has some pretty nice raised beds filled with veggies!

Their tomatoes are about as sad as mine, but they've got more cabbage than you can shake a stick at. I see a lot of slaw in someone's future!