Mixed Bouquets, mixed results....

It is fascinating to think of the huge quantities of mixed bouquets that are sold daily at corner stores, supermarkets and farmers markets.  Most flower stands have two to three times the number of mixed bouquets to bunches of one flower which attest to their popularity.  I expect that most shoppers take them home and put them in a vase just as they come out from the cellophane. 

This group at Grand Central station for $42.99 a bunch must be the Cadillac of mixed bunches.  Looks to me like 4 large callas, some purple statice, 4 red roses, yellow button mums, 3 godetia and a large lily (only in bud here).

At the grocery store, I recently purchased ($8.99) the mixed bouquet above to harvest for the cockscomb (reds and oranges looking like brain coral) and the gomphrena (pink and white gumdrops).  Thinking they could dry in the arrangement as well as not, I challenged myself to make lemonade from these, albeit, colorful lemons.

Taking apart the bouquet, it resolved itself into:  3 stems of willow celosia pink, 2 mini sunflowers,  5 stems of mixed cockscomb, one orange gladiola, one white gladiola, and 6 stems each of the pink and white gomphrena. 

I chose a honey bee ceramic container and reused a piece of oasis that I had kept hydrated in a plastic bag.  OK so the direct ratio of my interest in mixed bouquets is in proportion to reuse of oasis!!  If you want to reuse oasis, you must have a piece like this which has very few holes (technical term) where stems have been placed.  The oasis must not dry out.  It can be frozen(!) or kept in the fridge.  Be sure that any flower stem goes into 'fresh' oasis not where there is an air channel from an old stem. 

This post is about color so I won’t get in to the problems of the scale (size) of the flowers.  I chose the modern mass style (see “The Pastels of June”, June for the anatomy of a modern mass arrangement). First, I had to solve the problem of the two sunflowers looking like big brown eyes!  To cope with that I kept them together but at an angle to each other so you really didn’t see them side by side, so no 0|0!  Maybe one brown eye at a time is slightly better?

Continuing the groups, the muted reddish cockscomb was clustered around one side of the sunflower, with other colors continuing around.  Using toothpicks in the cockscomb stem helps hold them in place, acting as a fulcrum.

The single orange gladiola was cut into two pieces and placed together to make a cluster, placed close to the warmer red cockscomb.  I tried to keep the purpley-pink together out of sight of the hottest colors.

The pink gomphrena were placed near a more subdued cockscomb color and the white gladiola was also cut and placed as a cluster. No matter what you do with the white it acts as an eye grabber.

By using the materials in clusters, the groups appear more as the same size rather than tiny gomphrena dots with a large sunflower.  Finally, I placed the wispy willow celosia in a cluster at the top.

Not ideal, and the worst was that when I returned home after a few days, the whole thing had been thrown out. My crop saving will have to begin again!

Cheers!

Anatomy of a design

Pediment/Pentimento

 the flower show:  Loyalist Legacy

Class 1 Pediment/Pentimento                          4 Entries 

A design staged on a fluted pedestal 42” high with a 14” square top. Design not to exceed 14” from center of pedestal top on either side. Viewed from all sides.

An often asked question is, "where do your ideas come from?"  In this case, I began with the dictionary.  The alliterative class title contrasted two kinds of forms: pediment, the geometric triangle of classical buildings and pentimento, which, in one meaning, means delicate interlacing of lines.  This contrast of form of the solid and airy would be the basis of my design.

Materials: 

a sheet of oasis glued to Styrofoam (bought this years ago at a workshop and despaired of ever using it - haven't seen it for sale elsewhere, but also haven't looked) 

1/2" wooden dowel

oval wooden 'plaque' (Michael's)

   
Styrofoam/oasis is 3.5" thick.
Cut dowel, screwed into the base.  

Wanting to avoid a predictable, horizontal triangle, I shaped it vertically,  deconstructing it from a pediment to a vertical triangle.  The dowel is jammed into point of the triangle so it stands upright.  

I found the resulting top, which was straight across rather less than dynamic, so I added another smaller triangle (top, right) – this creates more interest, and takes the concept further from a literal idea.  The long edge of this topmost piece becomes the hydrated oasis.  

 The rather odd cut, barely seen in the top oasis, separates the part that is actually hydrated from the rest of the oasis on the form, and becomes the water source for plant material. 

The plant material chosen would be lacey and open, suggesting a kind of tracery.

Plant materials are:

Aspidistra - long leaves used to cover triangle

Jasmine - lacy pink & white vines

Clematis - both large white & smaller pink 

Nigella pods - love-in-a-mist pods color of clematis centers

The day before the show I bought my plant materials and conditioned them thoroughly, or thought I did.  I took a first time chance on using the clematis as the show was only up for one day. In the end, they didn't fare very well....

Five bunches of Aspidistra leaves are used to upholster the form.  This was the only part I practiced – several times – trying for as ‘clean’ a form as I could get.

  

This was my first attempt (right). I used the side 'seam' of the structure to line up the pinned leaves (see below also) and let them overlap each other on the front surface.  The hardware store yields a plethora of interesting pins/nails to be used in modern designs.  The secret is that their use needs to make sense from a design point of view and to use them precisely, otherwise they become a distraction. However....

As preciseness is not quite in my skill set, I decided on another method which would hide any pins I needed to do the job.  Because the aspidistra leaves have a stiff spine, I separated the leaves  (right of picture) down the spine.  They have a fat half and a narrower half (left).  Discard the spine.

Starting at the top of the triangle overlap a leaf from left and from right to cover the shape (left, above).  Once you are about a third of the way – descending –  one leaf half will fit from side to side.  I didn’t worry about the sides of the structure and their pins looking neat but just  kept the tacks close to the middle.   Once both the front surfaces were all covered, for the sides of the structure, put double stick carpet tape (Scotch brand)  on the back of whole leaves (removing the spine where it starts to thicken), and overlapping the leaves vertically as in the drawing (right).  The leaves on the front of the structure are placed starting at the top and going down overlapping each as you go.  The sides of the structure are placed in reverse, beginning  at the bottom and layering up.  All of the leaves will last without water easily for several days.   It is harder to describe or draw than to do!

I did make rather a production of the base so that I wouldn't have to use a lot of gravel (Accent Decor) to fill it up.  One can always take a LOT of gravel and just fill it up instead of doing it this way!
Base:   12” square tin tray, sprayed black  then a 12" x 12" styrofoam.  Place the base on the styrofoam.   Fill in with torn newspaper strips to raise the level and top it off with 12” X 12” piece of black paper. Finally the gravel...   

At the show, the best laid plans…….

The two triangles did not fit together as well as they should and once the upper one was hydrated the whole design was quite top heavy.  If it didn’t sit straight, the rest of the design wouldn't matter at all.  Wooden skewers held the two triangles together.  Using more padded newspaper to level between the top triangle and the larger one, more aspidistra leaves were then slipped in to cover the gap (whew!).

Would that I had had a step stool when adding the tracery - it was was up high and hard to see the Oasis gap between the leaves in which to put the fragile stems.  On reflection, it was almost like a crack In the pediment that sprouted vegetation.

 “triangle/tracery”

Although I usually resist using a title/intent for my designs,  I used this simple one as my intent.

The camaraderie of designers is infectious in these shows.  We all mumble and stumble and help each other.  Don't you think my fellow exhibitors in the class used luscious plant materials in gorgeous colors  in their designs?

It was hard to photograph these without the distracting backgrounds of the lovely club.  You can see that it was one part of a very lovely flower show.  Congratulations to the Garden Club of Lawrence and the hard-working flower show committee!

Cheers!

The pastels of June

Easy modern designs

June, moon, spoon ran the old song, and pastel shades flood the gardens, flower stands, and flower markets.  Last week four students came to The Barns to create modern mass arrangements.  These contemporary designs are not your mother’s mass arrangements.  These focus on a strong container and bold blocks of color and texture.  Butterflies and bees would be harmed trying to fly through these designs! 

Materials were chosen because they offered contrasts of textures – shiny vegetables, lush bold peonies, feminine roses played against the floriferous busyness of hydrangea, the dark sheen of galax leaves.

In the demonstration design above, you see that the materials are kept in groups placed next to each other, rather than an open (those birds and butterflies again!) interspersed placement.  The solidity and boldness of the groupings balance the height and heft of the container, which is an important element of the design.

As with most things, the design reveals itself by the doing of it.  For first timers, there is a give and take to get the design to take shape.  It is fun to watch the moment when you can literally see the student ‘get it’ and start to have fun with it.  The simple verdigris 'copper' container – rather like a beaker – was filled with material (see cross section) and a shaped block of oasis put on the top.  It should sit well above the top edge of the container so stems may be placed at an angle.  The oasis can be taped to the container to keep it in place.  However I find either the tape is just where I want to put a stem or it shows on the container. Instead we used kitchen skewers, poked through the hydrated oasis into the oasis pieces that we used to fill the container.  Because the arrangement will be top-heavy, ‘ballast’ in the form of hydrated oasis, stones, gravel or sand will keep it from toppling over.

The angled materials disguise the rim so container becomes a seamless element of the whole design. The materials were purple allium, lavendar spider mums, crème de la crème roses, green peppers, celosia (the marvelous green brain coral looking material), hydrangea and galax leaves.  The visual weight of the massed materials balances the height of the container. 

  

 

Although all the materials supplied were the same, notice how different each one is. They did not have to use all the materials but most did.  To water the design, slip ice cubes between the stems at the top, they will melt into the oasis keeping it hydrated. 

    

Every kind of material is grist for the mill of this design.  The one above is simpler and made from the supermarket, in a slightly smaller container from Michael's.  This ceramic container is heavier so no need for so much 'ballast'.  I just plopped the oasis on the top.   Bunches of 3 peonies, 3 spider mums, 6 carnations plus 6 jalapeno peppers.  Happy designing….

Cheers!