June 2010 Newsletter

New Floral Design Studio

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Flower Duet is hap­py to announce a new loca­tion in the South Bay.

We have moved to:
2675 Sky­park Dri­ve, Suite 205, Tor­rance, CA 90505

This is a great space in a con­ve­nient loca­tion. We are across the street from Lowe’s and in-between Cost­co and Sam’s Club. We will be hav­ing an open house this sum­mer to celebrate…so look for that invite!

With this new space comes the oppor­tu­ni­ty to have class­es more often and to accom­mo­date more peo­ple. Here is the list of group class­es we have planned for the remain­der of the year. How­ev­er, we are hap­py to sched­ule class­es based on demand. We are cur­rent­ly plan­ning anoth­er wed­ding work­shop and some tours to the Flower Mart in the upcom­ing weeks. So be sure to let us know if you are inter­est­ed in those options.

• June 17, 2010 Clas­sic Dozen Ros­es in a Vase
• July 15, 2010 Fun with Suc­cu­lents and Fresh Flowers
• August 19, 2010 Night in the Trop­ics — Exot­ic Flowers
• Sep­tem­ber 16, 2010 Sun­flower Topiary
• Octo­ber 14, 2010 Wed­dings – Hand tied and Wired flowers
• Novem­ber 18, 2010 Just in Time for Thanks­giv­ing – Set of Three Centerpieces
• Decem­ber 23, 2010 Just in Time for Christ­mas — Ever­green Hol­i­day Centerpiece

We will con­tin­ue to share the space with Randy Schwartz Pho­tog­ra­phy. In the event that you are build­ing your free­lance flo­ral design port­fo­lio ‚we will have a mini set avail­able for you to bring your cam­era and pho­to­graph your work after you have com­plet­ed it or to record the step by step.

We can teach you any­thing you want to learn and are avail­able for pri­vate lessons.

Father’s Day Flowers – History and How To

History of Father’s Day

Father’s Day is a cel­e­bra­tion inau­gu­rat­ed in the ear­ly twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry to com­ple­ment Moth­er’s Day in cel­e­brat­ing father­hood and male par­ent­ing. It is also cel­e­brat­ed to hon­or and com­mem­o­rate our fore­fa­thers. The first obser­vance of Father’s Day is believed to have been held on June 19, 1910 through the efforts of Sono­ra Dodd. From Spokane, Wash­ing­ton, Dodd thought inde­pen­dent­ly of the hol­i­day on a Sun­day in 1909 while lis­ten­ing to a Moth­er’s Day ser­mon at her church. She want­ed a cel­e­bra­tion that hon­ored fathers that were like her own father, William Smart, a Civ­il War vet­er­an, whose wife died when Sono­ra was 16 and he had to take care of all six children.

Even though it was intro­duced to become a nation­al hol­i­day for many years begin­ning in 1910, it was not until 1966 that Pres­i­dent Lyn­don John­son made a procla­ma­tion for third Sun­day of June to be Father’s Day. It was­n’t made an offi­cial nation­al hol­i­day until Pres­i­dent Nixon made a procla­ma­tion in 1972.

Flowers for Father’s Day?

Flow­ers are not a tra­di­tion­al gift for dads on Father’s Day. Most dads get a new tie, box of golf balls or pow­er tool. We know from our florist busi­ness that every­one loves flow­ers though…including the men in our lives. So, we took a casu­al poll among friends and fam­i­ly to find out what types of flow­ers men like to receive.

Most men like to get flow­ers they can plant in the gar­den. So, a good bet is to go to the plant nurs­ery or home improve­ment cen­ter and pick out a flow­er­ing plant that will look nice your gar­den (that is if your father likes to gar­den like ours does).

Next on the list – flow­ers in mas­cu­line col­ors are a safe choice like dark pur­ple iris­es, and deep red ros­es like Black Mag­ic (appar­ent­ly my husband’s favorite which I just found out by ask­ing him last night).

Trop­i­cal flow­ers are a good option as well. Flow­ers like red gin­ger, all types of Anthir­i­um, and all types of orchids are very pop­u­lar flower choic­es with men.

Anoth­er idea is to make a flower arrange­ment in the col­ors of your dad’s favorite sports team. My hus­band is a big Los Ange­les Lak­ers fan. Their col­ors are pur­ple and gold which is an excel­lent com­bi­na­tion in flo­ral design since they are oppo­sites on the col­or wheel.

Below, we cre­at­ed a fun idea for the father in your life. It’s a 4 or 6‑pack of his favorite bev­er­age (you can drink the first one to make the vase) and a cute arrange­ment of flow­ers to tell him how much you love him and are grate­ful to have him in your life.

How to Make a Father’s Day Flower Arrangement – Six-Pack Flowers

Step 1 Go to the gro­cery store and pur­chase a six-pack of the dad’s favorite beer or soda.

Step 2 While you are at the gro­cery store pick­ing up the beer or soda, pick out a small bunch of flowers.

STEM TIP: Try to use thin-stemmed flow­ers. You’ll only need about 6–8 stems of flow­ers as long as they are on the thin side. If your dad’s favorite flower is the sun­flower, you’ll prob­a­bly only be able to fit one into the bottle.

COLOR TIP: Try to match the col­ors of the flow­ers you choose with the col­ors of pack­ag­ing on the six-pack to make a com­pli­men­ta­ry look to your arrangement.

FRESHNESS TIP: Make sure all the flow­ers look fresh and none of the petals are turn­ing brown or look tired and droopy.
Step 3 Drink one of beers or sodas and wash out the emp­ty bot­tle (only drink the beer of you are over 21 – oth­er­wise, ask Mom to drink it for you).

Step 4 Fill up the bot­tle with water and the cor­rect amount of flo­ral food. Fol­low direc­tions on the pack­age that came with the bunch of flow­ers from the store. If the direc­tions call for more water than can fit in the bottle…mix as per direc­tions and save the flo­ral food water to replen­ish the arrange­ment as it drinks the water dur­ing the week.

Step 5 Sep­a­rate the flow­ers so that they are in piles of like flow­ers and remove all the green­ery that will be below the water line in your bot­tle vase. As shown here.

Step 6 Pick 6–8 of the best flow­ers from the bunch. You will most like­ly have a lot of left­over flow­ers if you got a big bunch from the store. I did not use over half the flow­ers from my bunch. You just can’t fit too many stems into a beer or soda bottle…so you can save mon­ey on the flowers!

Step 7 Place in vase/bottle – start­ing with the low­est flow­ers first. Cut the bot­tom of each stem just a lit­tle bit right before you put it in the vase to make sure it can drink the water.

Step 8 Place the fin­ished design back into the six-pack with the oth­er full bot­tles and you have a great gift to give to the spe­cial father in your life!

Gemini Florascope — 21 May — 20 June – Passion Flower

About Florascopes

For years, astrologers have linked per­son­al­i­ty traits with the night sky. A fun book called Flo­ras­cope: The Secret Astrol­o­gy of Flow­ers offers a dif­fer­ent take on your every­day horo­scope. This is meant to enter­tain and if you are so intrigued, buy the book! It makes a great gift.

Passion Flower (Gemini) Traits

If you are a Pas­sion Flower (or Gem­i­ni) you have an easy charm about you and are quite wit­ty. Pas­sion Flow­ers are insa­tiably curi­ous and have exquis­ite taste. Pas­sion Flow­ers get along well with mag­no­lias, ros­es, orchids, tiger lilies, lotus and oth­er Pas­sion Flow­ers. Famous Pas­sion Flow­ers include James Brown, Bob Dylan, Judy Gar­land and Nicole Kidman.

About Passion Flowers

Pas­sion flower is one of the most admired flow­ers and has inspired many poets. A trop­i­cal peren­ni­al vine, with white and pur­ple-blue scent­ed flow­ers, it is native to Brazil and Argenti­na and wide­ly found from Vir­ginia to south­ern Illi­nois and south­east Kansas, south to Flori­da and Texas in USA. Pas­sion flow­ers have high med­i­c­i­nal val­ue includ­ing mild seda­tive and anti-anx­i­ety effects.

Floral Design Book Review

Flower Con­fi­den­tial: The Good, the Bad, and the Beau­ti­ful by Amy Stewart.

Amy Stew­art offers a behind-the-scenes look at the com­mer­cial flower indus­try and you won’t believe some of the sto­ries she’s uncov­ered. The sto­ry behind how the won­der­ful­ly pop­u­lar and smelling Stargaz­er Lily was invent­ed is fas­ci­nat­ing for one. She also cov­ers the crazy Tulip­ma­nia peri­od in Hol­land when one bulb went for the price of a house at the time! She also vis­its the world-famous Dutch auc­tion in Aalsmeer – out­side Ams­ter­dam. Stew­art offers a view on the cut flo­ral busi­ness you’ve nev­er thought about and it’s tru­ly a good read.

Floral Tool — Florist’s Foam

One entire soaked brick of foam goes into the mid­dle of the vase.

When you want to keep your stems moist and in a par­tic­u­lar design, wet flo­ral foam can be a florist’s best friend.

• How to Soak – Fill up a large buck­et or sink with water and flo­ral food mix­ture. Drop in foam and let it sink by itself. Don’t push the foam down in the water. Let the foam sit in the water/food mix­ture for 15–30 minutes.
• Don’t re-use foam – Bac­te­ria can grow in the foam, so it’s not wise to re-use foam.
• Cut foam when wet (not dry) – The dust from flo­ral foam is carcinogenic.
• Left­over foam — If you have wet foam left over that is enough to cre­ate anoth­er arrange­ment, place in a Ziploc and store in the refrig­er­a­tor. It can store for weeks!
• Dry foam stor­age – Keep in a Ziploc bag. Keep out of the sun or light.

Oasis® is a brand name flo­ral foam com­pa­ny. Their prod­ucts can be found at the flo­ral sup­ply stores down­town and online. Wet foam comes in all dif­fer­ent shapes and sizes.