birthday gift

Thank you, dubium, for holding on long enough for me to work with you on a birthday arrangement for my friend Liz. Keeping it company: a few early blooming stems from my purple leaf plum bush and a couple of boxwood-like foliage stems (not positive what they are, but they smell great - anyone?).

I had never seen dubium before picking up a few stems at the grocery store last week. I can't get enough of that vibrant orange. 

achieving the good & beautiful

I cannot think you can make rules about these things. One can only have an idea of what seems good and beautiful, and then use any means to achieve it.  -  Constance Spry in Flower Decoration, 1934.

One step I recently took toward achieving what seems good and beautiful to me was ordering four books that I can hardly wait to devour from cover to cover.

  

 

First up, Bringing Nature Home - a recently released piece of eye candy for anyone prone to fits of obsession over flowers and home design. All flower arrangements were styled by Nicolette Owen of Brooklyn's Little Flower School. One of these days I will have a pretty little jar devoted to saving spare change and dollars to attend a class there. (I am bright green with envy over anyone able to attend the flower arranging workshop this Sunday, April 15, hosted by West Elm in NYC in honor of the book release, where participants will get hands on tutelage from Nicolette.)

A couple of pages from Bringing Nature Home, courtesy of Design Sponge:

Next up are two books featuring the afore-quoted Constance Spry - the highly influential British floral designer from the 1920s. 

Constance's arrangements were decidedly wild, natural, loose and fluid at a time when extremely formal, stiff arrangements held together with wire were preferred among designers. Today, it's easy to see her influence on many of my favorite floral designers.

 Constance Spry, working her nonconformist magic.

In the post "Past & Present: Constance Spry & Floral DIY", Design Sponge's Amy Azzarito notes that Constance "used materials that were usually discarded, like grasses and berries. She embraced vegetables in arrangements and preferred non-traditional containers. She would frequently raid her clients’ cupboards, pulling out serving pieces to use as unorthodox (for the time) vases." 

In the same post, the wildly talented floral designer Amy Merrick calls Constance the "first lady of floral design," and notes: "Constance was ... a voracious frequenter of antique and junk shops. Her hunts for interesting vases — from rusted cans to upside-down hats — are the stuff of legend." 

Based on that description, it should be clear to anyone who knows me well (or at all, really) why I was so excited to order these two books:

 

A small compilation of Constance Spry's arrangements (click image for source):

 Flowers of Fennel and Orange Lilies, 1951

 June morning, 1951

And last, but certainly not least, I'll be anxiously awaiting my copy of Design*Sponge at Home to arrive. It is chock full of home tours, DIY projects, step-by-step tutorials on everything from stripping and painting furniture to hanging wallpaper and reupholstery, before and after makeovers of rooms, spaces and furniture, and flower arranging tips (including twenty arrangements !!!). 

 

So if you don't see or hear from me in a while...

practice

It started with a bucket of flowers - nothing terribly fancy, just my weekly pick from the grocery store. Since there were waxflowers, I had to get them. 

The other offerings weren't so exciting, so I went with what I knew would last a while since I wasn't sure when I would get the chance to play around with them. And as I've said here before, I'll always have a fondness for alstromeria, regardless of (because of?) how ubiquitous they are. You you can almost always count on finding them at the florist corner or checkout at your local grocery store, that you can probably afford them, and that they will grace your home with beauty for at least two weeks. 

I also liked the contrast of the flecks of bright pink in the waxflower against the green-yellow of the goldenrod. 

I had a flower frog that I found recently at a local thrift shop, and was interested in trying it out to make a short, squat, full arrangement. 

I'm pretty pleased with my first "formal" arrangement, though its a bit more formal / wedding centerpiece -like than I'd prefer. I'm hoping that with practice I will eventually be able to create stunning wild arrangements more akin to my floral artist idols. 

Practice, practice practice. 

summer shoes

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I just got an email from Soludos announcing their new Shibori line, made with authentic shibori pattern fabric imported from Japan. If I had not gone so hog wild last summer, buying four pairs (above) after seeing a post about them on Katy Elliot's blog, I would be so tempted to order at least four more pairs from their new collections! But 8 + pairs of Espadrilles feels excessive, even to a shoe hoarder like myself. 

According to the email, Shibori is a Japanese term for dyeing cloth with a pattern by binding, stitching, folding, twisting, compressing it or capping. I absolutely love these:

I also love these new vibrant Aztec inspired prints:

And while I have not jumped on the Ikat bandwagon when it comes to household textiles, I would gladly sport the trend on my feet with any of these beauties:

We'll see how long my willpower lasts. Their espadrilles look cute with jeans, capris, shorts, skirts and dresses, and are very comfortable. I highly recommend treating yourself to a pair!

Happy Spring!

waxflower

I almost can't stand how adorable waxflowers are. It's hard for me to pick absolute favorites with flowers, but they have to be in the top three. Or at least five. That is to say that I really, really love them and I can never resist buying a bunch when I see them.