September 2013 Newsletter

Learn to Create an Ocean and Beach Centerpiece with Succulents and Flowers

by Kit Wertz

Kit Wertz of Flower Duet entered the Mayesh Whole­sale Florist Design Stars Con­test with this video entry. She shows you how to cre­ate a beach and ocean-inspired cen­ter­piece using suc­cu­lents, Tilland­sias, and fresh flowers.

Mayesh Design Star Background

I entered a con­test to be a video host for Mayesh Whole­sale Florist, our main sup­pli­er of whole­sale flow­ers which has its head­quar­ters in Los Ange­les. We love work­ing with our local sales spe­cial­ists at LAX Mayesh, Toni and Jes­si­ca, who have helped us cre­ate some beau­ti­ful events and are always grate­ful for Steve and Sean’s assis­tance at our local Tor­rance Mayesh.
When­ev­er we need a big order of spe­cial­ty flow­ers, Mayesh deliv­ers! Toni, Jes­si­ca, and Steve help us find the hard to locate items such as an order of 450 stems of white Hydrangea for an event in March this year, as well as every day needs like Gar­den Ros­es, Seed­ed Euca­lyp­tus, and Mini Calla Lilies. What­ev­er we need, they can pret­ty much find it for us and for that, we are tru­ly grateful.

We start all our month­ly group tours down­town at the Los Ange­les Flower dis­trict at the Mayesh loca­tion because they have such a com­pre­hen­sive selec­tion of flow­ers for sale through­out the year. It’s a great way to get our feet wet at the mar­ket and lets our tour par­tic­i­pants quiz us on all the unusu­al and beau­ti­ful flow­ers they have to offer to the pub­lic and trade.

For the past two years, Mayesh has engaged a florist who hosts month­ly video webisodes on their web­site in order to high­light the new prod­ucts they offer. This gives an oppor­tu­ni­ty for florists around the coun­try to see what’s avail­able (they ship nation­wide) and see what the lat­est trends are in flo­ral design for wed­dings, events and in retail shops.

We can’t rec­om­mend Mayesh high­ly enough and I would be proud to rep­re­sent that great busi­ness as one of its next Design Star hosts. Wish me luck! The final­ists will be announced Sep­tem­ber 10th and pub­lic vot­ing will com­mence. You’ll get to help choose the next Mayesh Design Star…so stay tuned. We’ll let you know if I’m a lucky final­ist! Watch the video here and see the flower recipe below.

Ocean and Beach Inspired Centerpiece Video How-To

The Cras­su­la, ‘Liv­ing Coral’ is com­ple­ment­ed by the vibrant green of the Tra­che­li­um in this design.

For the video con­test entry, I had to cre­ate a design while nar­rat­ing. I knew I want­ed to cre­ate a cen­ter­piece that would fea­ture suc­cu­lents, some coral and a cou­ple of cute lit­tle air plants (Tilland­sias). I went to Mayesh to see what oth­er flow­ers I could pur­chase to mim­ic under­sea crea­tures and plants for this design!

At Mayesh I was lucky enough to find beau­ti­ful green Berzil­lia Berries, super fresh Green Jade Tra­ch­li­um, gor­geous bi-col­or pink and white stan­dard Car­na­tions and a vibrant stem of Ascle­pias ‘Moby Dick.” I also picked up Bear Grass (to mim­ic beach dune grass), a love­ly plumed grass that is preva­lent this time of year at the mar­ket and final­ly some just-bud­ded Pieris Japonica.

Watch how I put it togeth­er to be an all-around cen­ter­piece that would look great on a 72-inch round table. If this were for an actu­al event, I would accent it with some small pieces of drift­wood and white sea stars. Final­ly, I would add some votive can­dles if the event were to take place in the evening.

Flower Recipe for Beach Centerpiece

At left, are air plants called Tilland­sias. At right, is a suc­cu­lent with pur­ple and pink-tinged leaves that are great with the pink fea­tured in the Car­na­tion and Ascle­pias heads.

• 14 stems Bi-col­or Car­na­tion of Dark Pink and White (to mim­ic the pink sand beach­es of Barbados)
• 1 stem of coral col­ored Ascle­pias ‘Moby Dick’
• 9 stems of green Berzil­lia Berries
• 6 stems of green Jade Trachelium
• 2 small Tilland­sias or “Air Plants” (These live a long time and don’t need very much water! Make sure you edu­cate your cus­tomer on how to care for these. See our in-depth ari­cle on work­ing with Tilland­sias.)
• 5 purple/pink medi­um sized Suc­cu­lent rosettes (Echev­e­ria or Grap­tove­ria would work well; Mayesh sells many vari­eties of Suc­cu­lent rosettes)
• 5 stems of ‘Moth­er of Thou­sands’ Kalan­choe Suc­cu­lents (these are very easy to grow in your own garden)
• 1 large stem of Cras­su­la ‘Liv­ing Coral’ (also easy to grow in the garden)
• 1/3 bunch of Bear Grass
• 5 stems of a Plume-type grass
• 5 stems Pieris Japonica

Wedding and Event Flowers from Recent Area Celebrations by Flower Duet

by Flower Duet

We’ve had a busy sum­mer and would like to show you a few events we had at our area venues includ­ing Ter­ranea Resort, Palos Verdes Golf Club and La Ven­ta Inn. Enjoy and be inspired to come to one of our class­es this fall.

Brunch Meeting at Terranea Resort — Theme: Garden Flowers

We were asked to cre­ate 6 cen­ter­pieces and 4 cock­tails for this event. The theme was gar­den flow­ers and the rest was up to us! Casey cre­at­ed the short and tall cen­ter­pieces we did for each table. We col­lab­o­rat­ed on the short “cock­tail” designs and Kit cre­at­ed the bird­cage top­pers and sur­round­ing wreaths. We did not elect to put any flow­ers inside the cages. We did put a lit­tle ceram­ic bird in each cage, but felt like he could escape if he want­ed to fly around the grounds of Terranea!

Fea­tured above was a morn­ing brunch of event pro­fes­sion­als and the theme was Gar­den flow­ers. So, we used Gar­den ros­es, Hydrangea, Astilbe, Seed­ed Euca­lyp­tus, Freesia, and Cym­bid­i­um Orchids.

August Morning Wedding at La Venta Inn — Theme: White with Apricot Flowers

It was anoth­er beau­ti­ful day at La Ven­ta Inn in Palos Verdes Estates with a bride who asked us to do her bou­quets, cor­sages, bou­ton­nieres and arch dec­o­ra­tion. (They used bal­loons for their centerpieces.)

The color theme was simple using white, green and coral accents. We used White Hydrangea and Champagne roses for the arch that was suspended on two garlands of Salal which we ordered from Mayesh. We used coral-colored Viburnum berries for the corsage accents and White Calla Lilies and Roses for the bouquets. The bridesmaids’ bouquets were accented with Lily Grass.

August After­noon Wed­ding at Neigh­bor­hood Church and Recep­tion at Palos Verdes Golf Club — Theme: White Wedding/Pink and Yel­low Reception

Casey shows off her cre­ation for a fun-lov­ing bride who want­ed a BIG bou­quet full of Lilies, Ros­es, and Mums!

For this August bride in Palos Verdes Estates, we cre­at­ed white bou­quets for her bridal par­ty and a pink and yel­low recep­tion theme.

Book Recommendation: To Have and To Hold

Flower Duet picked up this love­ly bou­quet col­lec­tion, To Have & To Hold: Mag­i­cal Wed­ding Bou­quets, at a local book sale last week­end and even though it’s a few years old, the designs are still quite rel­e­vant for today’s bride. It’s worth a sec­ond look and if you’re lucky, you can pick up a used copy for a bargain!

We think you’ll love the imag­i­na­tive use of veg­eta­bles, fruit and even chili pep­pers in some of the bou­quets! Check it out!

Floral Design Tool:
Imitation Cast-Resin Coral, Driftwood and Sea Shells

This sure looks real, but it’s cast resin.
Where to pur­chase coral: Save-On Crafts.com

Add the fin­ish­ing touch to your beach or ocean-themed event by includ­ing arti­fi­cial coral or this grape wood that can mim­ic drift­wood in your dec­o­rat­ing. The coral is made with resin and looks like the real thing! I used some­thing like this in my how-to flo­ral design video on how to cre­ate a beach and ocean themed cen­ter­piece. The grape wood branch­es are sand­blast­ed, so they look like sun­bleached driftwood.

Where to pur­chase grape­wood: Save-On Crafts.com

Ocean-Themed Props at Wasabi Green Down­town LA

You can find lots of ocean-themed props down­town at the Los Ange­les Flo­ral dis­trict at a ven­dor called Wasabi Green. We fea­tured them in a past flo­ral design newslet­ter. You can find sea glass and sea shells there as well as grape­wood. Their phone num­ber is: 213–629-0068.