Flower Tool :: Music Playlists for Making Floral Designs

By Kit Wertz

I am putting our flower tool rec­om­men­da­tion first in this newslet­ter since we are cel­e­brat­ing 20 years of Flower Duet! Yay! Here is the sto­ry behind our busi­ness name!

In col­lege, I was a dee­jay for both of my local pub­lic radio sta­tions. One was a clas­si­cal sta­tion and NPR mem­ber sta­tion (WMRA) where I was offered the job because I could pro­nounce all the Euro­pean com­pos­er names with a prop­er accent (thanks to years of lis­ten­ing to my par­ents’ clas­si­cal music albums on vinyl). I loved play­ing the clas­si­cal music, but also shar­ing the air­waves with Scott Simon dur­ing Week­end Edi­tion Sat­ur­day. It was my love for pub­lic radio that turned me onto the music I walked down the aisle to for my wed­ding and was the inspi­ra­tion for our name — Flower Duet. One of our local NPR sta­tions, KCRW, used to play the Flower Duet dur­ing pledge dri­ves to inspire lis­ten­ers to donate at the Angel lev­el. The song is from Léo Delibes opera, Lak­mé.  I loved this song! It was­n’t until I was lis­ten­ing to anoth­er of the fan­tas­tic pub­lic radio sta­tions in Los Ange­les, KUSC, when I found out the name of this famous song. The Flower Duet! Here it is…I am sure you may remem­ber it from old British Air­ways com­mer­cials, too.

Casey’s and my love of music did not only encom­pass clas­si­cal music. Our par­ents played rock (Rolling Stones, The Bea­t­les, and The Beach Boys) as well as lots of folk music (Peter, Paul & Mary, The Lime­lighters) and every Broad­way Musi­cal by Gersh­win, Porter, and Rogers & Ham­mer­stein. My broth­er, sis­ter and I all lis­tened to lots of rock, some punk rock and lots of alter­na­tive rock as teenagers.

While in col­lege, the oth­er sta­tion where I worked as a dee­jay was part of the Mass Com­mu­ni­ca­tions depart­ment (from which I earned my Bach­e­lor’s Degree) — WXJM. One of the shows I host­ed with a friend, Jim Van Slyke and we were known as The Avant Gar­den­ers. Our show was a fun mix of new col­lege bands and oth­er alter­na­tive bands. When I re-con­nect­ed with him on Face­book, I asked him what he was lis­ten­ing to and he said that his kids loved “Vam­pire Week­end.” I LOVE this band and would­n’t you know their new album fea­tures a song called “Sun­flower” and it is catchy and per­fect for mak­ing flo­ral designs. Take a listen.

When­ev­er we need to get into a groove, we play music in the stu­dio. Since we have design­ers from many back­grounds and we often have kids around, we have to pick and choose our music carefully.

Here are a few of the playlists we love and think would be great for your flower fling­ing. I think it’s fun­ny my first Dee­Jay name had a con­nec­tion to plants! It had more to do with my future career than the radio did, but radio still makes a huge impact on my life. I am a sus­tain­ing mem­ber to all three of my local pub­lic radio sta­tions and avid sup­port of Nation­al Pub­lic Radio.

Flower Playlist for Large Groups — Getting a Groove Going

There are lots of ways to have a music playlist these days. You can choose a radio sta­tion on Google Music, Ama­zon Music or Pan­do­ra. Casey uses Pan­do­ra and it’s a great way to pick a favorite musi­cian and then have a music playlist curat­ed around that vibe.

For large groups in the stu­dio, we like these bands’ radio sta­tions for flower mak­ing tunes:

Pink Martini Radio Station

Penguin Café Radio Station

Queen Radio Station

Vampire Weekend Radio Station

For solo work­ing, when we are try­ing to be con­tem­pla­tive or cre­ative we play:

Indigo Girls Radio Station

Jack Johnson Radio Station

Flower Duet designed and made 150 liv­ing flo­ral rings for the event. Each guest had the chance to choose a ring to wear dur­ing the event. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Flower Duet co-spon­sored an edu­ca­tion­al event with a group of event ven­dors with whom we work and meet each month. We call our­selves the Wed­ding & Event Heroes and had a suc­cess­ful 6th Annu­al Spring Event at Ter­ranea Resort last month fea­tur­ing our won­der­ful guest speak­er Julian Leaver!

Please vis­it our Wed­ding and Event Heroes Web­site to see pho­tos and video of the event: Eti­quette… To a Tee  

Guests post­ed on Insta­gram great pho­tos they cap­tured of liv­ing flo­ral rings, scrump­tious food and drinks, fab­u­lous live enter­tain­ment and our won­der­ful speak­er, Mr. Leaver!  Leslie McCam­mon was the (at ran­dom draw­ing) win­ner of our Insta­gram con­test.  She won a free round of golf at The Links at Ter­ranea and lunch at Nel­son’s Restau­rant.  Con­grat­u­la­tions, Leslie!

Sponsors: The Wedding and Event Heroes

Casey Schwartz & Kit Wertz — Flower Duet

Meg Walk­er — Made by Meg

KC Camp­bell — Vox DJs

Jack­ie Han­son — Design Vis­age

Miki & Son­ja Rakice­vic — Miki & Son­ja Photography

Alis­tair Tober — The VIPs Enter­tain­ment Inc.

Amy Berman – Vanil­la Bake Shop

Stel­la & Paul San­ti­a­go — Bof­fo Video

Nicole Lazo & Eleni Cuevas — Ter­ranea Resort

Guests play Cro­quet dur­ing Eti­quette To A Tee at Ter­ranea. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Detail of Flower Duet’s liv­ing flo­ral rings. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Casey Schwartz and Kit Wertz of Flower Duet pose in their Large flo­ral ring cir­cle arch at Eti­quette To A Tee at Ter­ranea on May 7, 2019. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

The col­ors for the event were hot pink and orange. Here is a fun Lil­ly Pulitzer inspired vase by Flower Duet. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Kit (left) laughs with guests dur­ing the pre­sen­ta­tion by Julian Leaver, AKA The Dap­per Diplo­mat. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Casey (far right) checks in guests at the event. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

Each guest received a cus­tomized note­book by Pop­pin, Sen­sa Pen and pro­gram for the event to take notes dur­ing the pre­sen­ta­tion by Julian Leaver. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

The Boy Band by VIPs Enter­tain­ment ser­e­nad­ed the guests dur­ing the cock­tail and net­work­ing hour. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

After the event, the mem­bers of the Wed­ding & Event Heroes posed with cro­quet mal­lets on the lawn at Ter­ranea. Pho­to by Miki & Son­ja Photography.

The empha­sis of the 1‑week camp will be on the Art of Flo­ral Design, but this study requires all aspects of sci­ence, tech­nol­o­gy, engi­neer­ing, art, and math! Here are some of the top­ics we’ll cov­er over the week. Campers will go home with their own cre­ation every day!

• Sci­ence of Dying Flow­ers Dif­fer­ent Colors
• Art of How to Choose Fresh Flowers
• Sci­ence of How to Keep Flow­ers Fresh
• Mak­ing a Flower Bou­quet to Send a Message
• We work as a Team to Engi­neer a Struc­ture and Attach Flowers
• Use Math to Make a prof­it with Fundrais­ing Flowers
• Explore the Sci­ence of Dying Fab­ric with Flower petals
• A Les­son on Mar­ket­ing Using Technology
• Artis­tic Jew­el­ry Box­es & Trea­sure Chests

Free Class of the Month: Flowers For Dad

Check out how to make a fun flower design for Father’s Day.

This is part of our ongo­ing Flower Arrang­ing Fri­day series you can sub­scribe to for a low month­ly fee! You’ll receive down­loads of the sup­plies used in each class, step-by-step video instruc­tion and lots of tips along the way!

A Full Bouquet of Lessons one Stem-At-A-Time

Our Flower Arrang­ing Fri­days series is a per­fect­ly-sized approach to learn­ing the art of flo­ral design. With each mini-class, we’ll show you a tru­ly use­ful flo­ral design tech­nique in a cur­rent event flo­ral design style. This class series will keep you won­der­ing what we’ll show you next!

As part of each class, you’ll receive: 
1. A down­load­able PDF list of sup­plies includ­ing the flower recipe.

2. Easy-to-fol­low mini video lessons so you’ll nev­er have to rewind the video to see a step again.

3. Tips and florist secrets to help you be a suc­cess­ful flo­ral arranger!

A while back in a newslet­ter we shared one of the deliv­ery sys­tems we use to trans­port flow­ers. It’s a fan­tas­tic Grid Kit prod­uct made by a Flori­da com­pa­ny — Semi­nole Flo­ral Deliv­ery Sys­tem.

Late­ly, we’ve been using it in dou­ble lay­ers to take twice as many flowers.

We have three Grid Kits. We’ve put one lay­er of grids on the bot­tom, added the longest pipes and put anoth­er lay­er on the top  (upside down). The bot­tom lay­er can hold flower vas­es and the top lay­er can hold flow­ers in long boxes.

The upcom­ing Slow Flow­ers Sum­mit has been in the works for near­ly a year now and as the date gets clos­er, Debra Prinz­ing is extend­ing a dis­count code for reg­is­ter­ing.  This year’s sum­mit is on July 1–2, 2019 in the Twin Cities of Min­neso­ta. Ms. Prinz­ing is extend­ing an offer of $50 off the cost of reg­is­tra­tion. “The suc­cess of the Sum­mit, now in its third year, is because of the diver­si­ty of those who attend – flo­ral design­ers and flower farm­ers, vet­er­ans in the indus­try and those who are new, pro­gres­sives in the Amer­i­can-grown flo­ral com­mu­ni­ty and peo­ple who attend to find out more about the Move­ment,” says Prinz­ing.  Use the coupon code $50OFF at the time of reg­is­tra­tion to receive the discount.

The Sum­mit for 2019 has an amaz­ing line­up of speak­ers, plen­ty of time to con­nect with fel­low atten­dees, amaz­ing food and inspir­ing venues.

It’s just 4 short weeks away. Reg­is­ter now!  Kit attend­ed the first Slow Flow­ers Sum­mit gath­er­ings in Seat­tle (2017) and both Casey and Kit were guest speak­ers at the sec­ond annu­al sum­mit in Wash­ing­ton, D.C. (2018).

Use the coupon code $50OFF to receive your dis­count­ed tick­et! To register:

1. Click here
2. Choose the quan­ti­ty of Gen­er­al (Non-Mem­ber) tick­ets you wish to purchase
3. At the bot­tom of the page, click Checkout
4. On the right side, click on Enter coupon code
5. Enter coupon code $50OFF and press Enter
6. Enter your per­son­al information
7. Click Con­tin­ue to com­plete payment

*this coupon code can be applied to the Slow Flow­ers Mem­ber and Gen­er­al (Non-Mem­ber) tick­et types

Here is a snap­shot video from last year’s event when Flower Duet Spoke:

Flower Book Recommendation:: A BIG IMPORTANT ART BOOK

Gain inspi­ra­tion from the fab­u­lous artists in this book for your own art­work.  I espe­cial­ly love the back­ground sto­ry on flo­ral instal­la­tion artist Rebec­ca Louise Law.

Rebec­ca Louse Law Art from The Big Art Book

From Ama­zon:

“Cel­e­brate 45 women artists, and gain inspi­ra­tion for your own prac­tice, with this beau­ti­ful explo­ration of con­tem­po­rary cre­ators from the founder of The Jeal­ous Cura­tor. Walk into any muse­um, or open any art book, and you’ll prob­a­bly be left won­der­ing: where are all the women artists? A Big Impor­tant Art Book (Now with Women) offers an excit­ing alter­na­tive to this male-dom­i­nat­ed art world, show­cas­ing the work of dozens of con­tem­po­rary women artists along­side cre­ative prompts that will bring out the artist in anyone!

This beau­ti­ful book ener­gizes and empow­ers women, both artists and ama­teurs alike, by pro­vid­ing them with projects and gal­va­niz­ing sto­ries to ignite their cre­ative fires. Each chap­ter leads with an assign­ment that taps into the inner artist, push­ing the read­er to make excit­ing new work and blaze her own artis­tic trail. Inter­views, images, and sto­ries from con­tem­po­rary women artists at the top of their game pro­vide added inspi­ra­tion, and his­tor­i­cal spot­lights on art “her­sto­ry” tie in the work of pio­neer­ing women from the past. With a stun­ning, gift-for­ward pack­age and just the right amount of pop cul­ture-infused fem­i­nism, this book is sure to cap­ture the imag­i­na­tions of aspir­ing women artists. ”