Garden Writers Design Bouquets with California-Grown Botanicals
September 25th, 2015
Garden Writers get to play with California Flowers at their annual symposium in Pasadena last week.
Last weekend, more than 300 members of the Garden Writers Association attended the annual symposium in Pasadena. As the past president, I was there. Two people asked whether I could involve the California Cut Flower Commission in the conference and it worked out beautifully to combine those opportunities.
Vice President and Program Chair Kirk Brown asked me to lead a floral design workshop at the Table Topics session on Saturday afternoon. That’s where hundreds of attendees move through 30 tables, speed-dating-like to engage with various experts and explore subjects of interest to the horticulture, communications, and media professions.
Local Arrangements Chair Lydia Plunk asked me to procure California-grown flowers to adorn the banquet tables at the Media Awards Ceremony Monday. Both requests were doable, made even easier because of the help of these incredibly generous companies:
Syndicate Sales donated USA-made hurricane-style vases for the centerpieces.
Eufloria Roses of Nipomo, California, donated more than 200 stems of gorgeous hybrid tea roses and spray roses.
Kitayama Brothers of Watsonville, California, donated lovely, fresh miniature gerberas, snapdragons and lilies.
Resendiz Brothers of Fallbrook, California, donated exquisite pincushion proteas, textured grevillea foliage and mixed greenery.
Resendiz Brothers Protea Growers
Stargazer Barn of Arcata, California, donated vivid tulips, irises and cotinus foliage.
Chris Sabbarese of Corona Tools tweeted out this photo.
I loved sharing these California blooms as a tangible example of the Slow Flowers movement.
We brought to life the conversation about local, American grown flowers and engaged my fellow garden communicators (writers, photographers, bloggers and educators) by getting them up close and personal to these fresh, beautiful botanicals.
After the workshop, the flowers were used to adorn the banquet tables at the Media Awards Banquet, held at the Pasadena Convention Center this past Monday evening.
My Slow Flowers project won a Silver Award, so it was indeed fitting to have local flowers on the tables that night. As a bonus, one lucky guest at each table “won” a bouquet to take home.
These are some of the photos that showed up on social media, which gives the local, American-grown story a very long shelf life!
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter photos from the Garden Writers event.
As a bonus, Stargazer Barn provided guests with a 15%-off coupon on a future order. If you missed it, feel free to use this one here:
September 25th, 2015 at 3:33 pm
Thank you, California Cut Flower Commission and Debra Prinzing! Everything was so beautiful and it made us feel great that we had local flowers to celebrate as we celebrated the accomplishments of the Garden Writers Association. Bouquets all around!