Flower Duet Featured in California Wedding Day Magazine — Winter 2015/2016 Issue

Flower Duet is for­tu­nate to once again be fea­tured as a choice flo­ral design com­pa­ny by Cal­i­for­nia Wed­ding Day Mag­a­zine. In the Win­ter 2015/2016 Best of 2015 issue, we have three bou­quets in the magazine.

Inside the front cov­er, on the TOC page, is our bright­ly hued pink and red bou­quet which fea­tured flow­ers such as Red Charm Peonies, Coral Sun­set Peonies, Cox­comb Celosia , Anenomes, Sweet William, Leu­ca­den­dron, Din­go fern, Fire­works grass, Camel­lia branch­es and Cordy­line tips.

We were also fea­tured in an arti­cle titled “Unbri­daled Beau­ty” on how brides can look pic­ture per­fect in the wed­ding photos.

We appear in the Haute List for the South Bay of Los Ange­les. It’s a guide to top-tier Cal­i­for­nia wed­ding ven­dors in Los Ange­les, Orange Coun­ty and beyond!

Pick up an issue today to learn more!

It’s a Tie! Rose Quartz and Serenity are Pantone’s 2016 Colors of the Year

Each year, the Pan­tone Col­or Insti­tute: declares a par­tic­u­lar hue to be the “Col­or of the Year”. Twice a year the com­pany holds a secret two-day meet­ing in a Euro­pean cap­i­tal and invites rep­re­sen­ta­tives from dif­fer­ent nations’ col­or stan­dards groups. This group choos­es a col­or that rep­re­sents the cur­rent zeit­geist culturally.

In 2015, the col­or of the year, Marsala, rep­re­sented “a dar­ingly invit­ing tone that nur­tures; exud­ing con­fi­dence and sta­bil­ity while feed­ing the body, mind and soul.”  The results of the meet­ing are pub­lished in ear­ly Decem­ber of the year pri­or and then fash­ion design­ers, florists, and tex­tile design­ers use this guide­line for products.”

For the first time, the group chose two shades as the 2016 Pan­tone Col­ors of the Year. A warm pink and cool blue called Rose Quartz and Seren­i­ty, respec­tive­ly. From Pantone:

“Rose Quartz is a per­sua­sive yet gen­tle tone that con­veys com­pas­sion and a sense of com­po­sure. Seren­i­ty is weight­less and airy, like the expanse of the blue sky above us, bring­ing feel­ings of respite and relax­ation even in tur­bu­lent times.”

Below, Flower Duet curat­ed a selec­tion of flow­ers that rep­re­sents this new sooth­ing hue pair­ing for 2016 and offers a few design exam­ples of how these flow­ers look in real arrangements.

Flowers for 2016 Pantone Color of the Year

Here are Flower Duet’s curat­ed choic­es of flow­ers which rep­re­sent Rose Quartz and Seren­i­ty. Pic­tured from top left clock­wise: Ohara Rose, Calla Lily, Blush­ing Bride Pro­tea, Lily of the Nile, Bell Flower, Corn­flower, Del­phini­um, Blue Hydrangea, Hyacinth, Love In The Mist (Nigel­la), Twee­dia, Pink Hydrangea, Pink Can­dle Celosia, Pink Asi­at­ic Lily, Pink Lark­spur, Pink Peony, and Hellebore.

The Flower Shop Mysteries Move from Books to Television

In our August 2012 flo­ral newslet­ter, we offered a sum­mer book read­ing rec­om­men­da­tion of The Flower Shop Mys­tery Series. Now there are 18 books in all by author Kate Collins and you can read them all on a Kin­dle or in paperback.

This fun sto­ry series is about a florist (for­mer­ly a lawyer) who seems to fall into a mur­der mys­tery every few weeks and is turned into a TV show on the Hall­mark Chan­nel. Its first episode is called: Flower Shop Mys­tery: Mums The Word.

It stars Brooke Shields, Bren­nan Elliott and Beau Bridges.

The show airs on Sun­day, Jan­u­ary 17, 2016, on the Hall­mark Movies & Mys­ter­ies Chan­nel at 9 p.m. (8 p.m. Central).

Abby Knight (Shields), a for­mer lawyer turned proud flower shop own­er is start­ing over after the death of her hus­band with the sup­port from her father (Bridges), a new busi­ness and her daugh­ter off to col­lege. Life is good in the peace­ful town of New Chapel but when a black SUV rams her prized vin­tage car, she’s deter­mined to track down the dri­ver. She begrudg­ing­ly accepts the help of a new neigh­bor, the hand­some and charm­ing ex-Marine Mar­co Sal­vare (Elliott) who just bought the bar down the street.  But their bud­ding rela­tion­ship is threat­ened when an acquain­tance is mur­dered and Abby’s good friend is the prime sus­pect and it all links back to the hit and run.  Caught up in a tan­gle of men­ac­ing phone calls, police cor­rup­tion and mur­der­ous road rage, Abby must work against the clock to find the killer or the next flower arrange­ment might be for her own funeral.

 January Flower Duet Classes

Orchids! Orchids! Orchids! Jan­u­ary should be renamed orchid month since Flower Duet is offer­ing two class­es this month fea­tur­ing dif­fer­ent types of orchids. In mid-Jan­u­ary, come to our stu­dio in the South Bay to learn how to design with tricky cut Pha­le­onop­sis stems and flow­ers in a swanky asym­met­ri­cal arrangement.

Then, at the end of the month, join us at The Hunt­ing­ton Library to cre­ate a design using vibrant cit­rus col­ors inspired by the cit­rus groves of kumquats, lemons, oranges and limes at the Gar­den in San Marino.

Asym­met­ri­cal Swanky fea­tur­ing Pha­le­onop­sis Orchids at Flower Duet’s Design Stu­dio in Torrance

• Cit­rus Col­ored flow­ers fea­tur­ing Cym­bid­i­um Orchids at The Hunt­ing­ton Library

Planning for Profit: A One-Day Workshop for Event Professionals

Dee Gaubert Pho­to: NoWorriesEventPlanning.com

By: Dee Gaubert of No Wor­ries Event Planning

Own­ing a busi­ness can be exhil­a­rat­ing and empow­er­ing — and also fraught with obsta­cles. Avoid these obsta­cles alto­geth­er and over­come any hur­dles that stand in your way, with this one-day work­shop focused on build­ing a prof­itable event plan­ning business!

Flower Duet’s December to Remember

As in every newslet­ter, we like to share a lit­tle of what we’ve done the past month. We had lots of hol­i­day par­ties, flo­ral class­es and even some win­ter wed­dings before the year’s end. We even sneaked in a trip to see the floats being built for the Tour­na­ment of Ros­es Parade in Pasade­na. Enjoy this pho­to view of a lit­tle bit of Flower Duet’s world.

December Wedding Snapshots

Holiday Party Flowers

Flowers for All Occasions!

Flow­ers are appro­pri­ate for every event, for every mile­stone in life. Whether you are cel­e­brat­ing your first bal­let recital (Kit’s daugh­ter) or a life­time of mem­o­ries for a loved one, flow­ers are welcome.

Tournament of Roses Parade — Float Decorating Viewing (Before the Parade)

By Kit Wertz

When I picked up my Los Ange­les Times on Mon­day, an insert fell out that was all about the Tour­na­ment of Ros­es Parade and the numer­ous events sur­round­ing the love­ly show­ing of fresh flowers.

Our last wed­ding of the year was on Decem­ber 28th, so Casey and I decid­ed to take our chil­dren to see the vol­un­teers for some of the floats dec­o­rate them at the Rose Palace in Pasadena.

Tick­ets were $10 to see the floats being adorned with flow­ers. We pur­chased our tick­ets online through SharpSeat­ing (they also pro­vide tick­ets to bleach­er seat­ing of the actu­al parade) and picked them up at the office on Col­orado Boule­vard. Then, we pro­ceed­ed to Ray­mond Avenue and the Rose Palace to check out the floats.

This is a great way to see what hap­pens before you decide to vol­un­teer some year to dec­o­rate (as Casey and our broth­er did in 2012). It’s also one step in a four-step process to real­ly expe­ri­ence the floats.

• Step 1: See the pre-dec­o­rat­ing of floats at the Rose Palace or Rose Bowl
• Step 2: Watch the parade live in per­son on Orange Ave. or Col­orado Blvd.
• Step 3: Go after the parade to view the parked floats on Sier­ra Madre Blvd.
• Step 4: Vol­un­teer to dec­o­rate a float!

Flower Book Recommendations: Floral Coloring Books & Apps for Adults

Once upon a time, col­or­ing books for adults were con­sid­ered sub­ver­sive. In the 1960s, they made fun of cor­po­rate cul­ture, fear of Com­mu­nism and con­spir­a­cy the­o­rists. In 2016, they are the on the best­seller list on Ama­zon! Tout­ed as a form of “art ther­a­py” or way to med­i­tate and unplug, peo­ple of all ages are get­ting out their pen­cils, crayons and sty­lus pens to col­or their cares away.

Accord­ing to an arti­cle this week in the Wall Street Jour­nal (WSJ), new activ­i­ties are pop­ping up at libraries all over the coun­try as BYOB col­or­ing book par­ties. Bring your own col­or­ing books and pens and spend time with oth­er like-mind­ed adults. Also accord­ing to the WSJ, eight of the top 20 books sold on Ama­zon are col­or­ing books designed for adults.

There are two ways to col­or: by hand with pen­cil and paper or elec­tron­i­cal­ly with your phone or tablet. Yes, there is even an App for col­or­ing — actu­al­ly many apps.

Coloring Apps

Learn­ing to col­or using a phone or tablet takes a lit­tle nav­i­gat­ing and I sug­gest using a sty­lus pen. It can be tedious to try to col­or in lit­tle dots of col­or with the tip of your fin­ger when pre­cise motions are required.

The Google Play store has a vari­ety of free apps for col­or­ing avail­able. Just do a search for “Col­or­ing Books for Adults” and you’ll receive results that include apps like Col­orfy and  Col­or­ing.

There are also a pletho­ra of apps to down­load and try out for free on iTunes. Do the same search for col­or­ing books and you may find Col­orme by Wei LeJun.

Any way you decide to col­or, it’s fun. If you use an app, it’s easy to share your elec­tron­ic copies of your art online using social media out­lets or email.

Coloring Books for Adults

Book stores, craft stores and even chil­dren’s toy stores car­ry these types of sophis­ti­cat­ed col­or­ing books and Amazon.com car­ries almost 4000 titles that fall into the “col­or­ing books for adults relax­ation” cat­e­go­ry.