Peaches N Cream

Lucy and Jo languishing prettily in my loungeroom.  A living, breathing Waterhouse painting.

summer harvest

Spent a solid day in the garden yesterday, here at the farm.  We had so much rain this past Spring that everything shot up the most amazing amount of growth, but the plants just can’t sustain it in the heat unless I pour gallons of water onto it all (and I just can’t do that).  Anyway, the plus side is armfuls and barrowloads of beautiful stems and seedpods; this urn arrangement is a summer tangle of these.  The peonies are from Victoria but everything else is farm-grown.

For me, this kind of arrangement has real meaning, in the sense that it represents what I love about floristry: a connection to nature and the ability to follow through a plant’s life from seedling to harvest.  It’s not going to win any prizes at a floristry show, it’s much too loose, but it’s the kind of unruly beauty that I love.  And I’d take that over a pristine, oversprayed, hothouse, plastic wrapped bunch of imported perfection any day.

Crabapples from my friend Maria’s orchards in Stirling. Brass pot from The Props Dept, Adelaide.

A bouquet from last weekend. Photo: White Wall Photography, South Australia.

Urn supplied By The Props Dept, Adelaide.

In the studio

So much. So much on, so many emails, so many early mornings, phonecalls, long drives, people, messages, so much to do, so much.  Rush rush rush rush.

And then there is the solace of the flower studio.  Its dark grey walls, cool concrete floor and the hum of the fridges. There is a blackbird nesting in the vine growing on the outside wall, it cheers me up.  And so do the flowers.  The flowers.  They are a constant source of beauty, and of calm.  Which is why as humans we are drawn to them;  they offer up a window to nature, and a few stolen seconds of tranquility.

Spring jewels.

I have been sick as an old dog for nearly the whole month, and the flowers just keep happily blooming without me. It’s harsh but true.  I was in bed for a week with flu and I walked outside after 8 days and the Cecile Brunner rambling rose on the verandah was positively bursting with sprays of exuberant pink. Time waits for no man, or flower lady.

The season so far has been the perfect mix of rain and shine - I used to complain about late rain in spring putting a dampener on fun, but not any more.  Now I lie inside listening to the rain on the roof and I know that outside all the plants would be smiling if they were able.  The flowers at the farm are growing and growing in billowing drifts of green and many are ready for cutting.

Darkest hellebores and miniature daffodil “Tete a Tete” from our Spring garden…

If I could be anywhere….wildflower meadow. And possibly my favourite movie ever.

Spring Springing

White prunus blossoms from our farm. They are always some of the first blossoms to emerge and I cut a huge armful of them to take into the studio.  Such delicate beauty infused with the faint scent of honey.  Blossoms = Spring= sunshine= blue skies = end of Winter= happy happy me.

Winter Bouquets

Every Winter I wonder if it really was a bad idea to move up here to the ‘Hills, its so damn cold.  We moan about our desire to buy a cosy apartment somewhere in the inner city with central heating and carpet and nice modern insulation.  But then Spring comes and I relent, and then get all smug and think that yes what a good idea it was to live out here, as if we would ever live in the city when the sun is shining on the orchard and the birds are peeping.  Winter can be hard. And muddy.

Anyway, to cheer us all up here are some of my bouquets, all made in Winter.  The people at the Tulip farm in Victoria work their magic so that we can get them early (mine are still green points poking through the soil).  These parrot tulips and double tulips are off the dial, amazing.  And the waterlilies….

New Studio

What a weekend.  See, it’s Wednesday and I still haven’t caught up.  What a great party on Sunday to celebrate the new studio we have made for The Bluebell Society, and for Justin’s wooden wonders at Oak&Elm.  It’s so lovely to now have a space to work that is beautiful and warm. And for people to come and visit and drink tea and talk about flowers.

I made these flowers as party arrangements for the studio launch and they flashed their pink-petaled beauty through the crowd.  How different they look in these pics; I crept back into the studio the next morning and captured them in the silence, with daylight softly filtering down from above. 

Adelaide Cabaret Festival

Now that the wedding season is coming to a close over the Winter, things should be calming down a bit in the world of flowers.  Not for this little flower lady, however; I’ve just come out the other side of the busiest week in recent memory. One major project has been creating floral installations for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival Gala Opening and Moet & Chandon after-party. The flowers had to sit alongside David Bromley’s paintings and the brief was for flowers that created a sense of wonder.  Inspired by the vertical gardens of Patrick Blanc verticalgardenpatrickblanc.com I dressed tall pillars in sheaths of foliage and longiflorum lilies so that guests stumbled across them in the crowded room. See installation pics below.

Warm as toast

Autumn oranges, peach and hot violet-pink.  Softened by burgundy and blush cream.  Sometimes colour clashes are a good thing. This bouquet is quite traditional in style but the colours give it a contemporary edge. Fluro is really growing on me (and I never thought I’d say that).

When nature is enough.  Roses from the garden, as is, just for me.

Autumn Inspiration

These bouquets were inspired by the colours of Autumn (see pic of our farm below).  Not the rich reds and corals of European trees, but more the seasonal colours of the landscape around here at this time of year: white and grey skies, muted greens, and the rich golden highlights of late afternoon light.  That amazing apricot David Austin rose is the exact colour of the sun setting through the trees.

Autumn at our farm, Shepherd’s Rest.

A Wedding in the Park

These bouquets were a delight to make. The bride wanted bouquets that provided a sensual experience: texture, colour and scent.  Delicate rose petals with soft lamb’s ears foliage and seasonal seedheads, all in shades of pink and beige-plum.  Elegant, romantic and understated for a wedding in the park.  Autumn hydrangeas from the Adelaide hills provided the perfect colour-link to the mushroom plum of the bridesmaid’s dress. Hyacinths mingled throughout the bouquets so that their soft scent carried on the breeze in the afternoon sunshine; I hope that every time the bride smells hyacinths she will be carried back to her wedding day. Romantic bliss.