It’s Wreath Time!

Inspiration for a Twist on the Fall Wreath

Fall wreath design made with found foliage includ­ing pep­per berries and medal­lion Euca­lyp­tus. A large Echev­e­ria acts as a dec­o­ra­tive “bow” type ele­ment. This wreath will dry well. The suc­cu­lent can be kept alive through­out the hol­i­day sea­son from Novem­ber to Jan­u­ary with a spritz of water week­ly as long as it is not in the direct sun. Flow­ers by Flower Duet. Pho­to by Kit Wertz.

This mon­th’s inspi­ra­tion comes from a friend of Kit’s who want­ed to learn how to make a wreath using for­aged foliage, seed­pods and grass­es. In a pri­vate les­son at our stu­dio, Kit showed her friend Hei­di which mate­ri­als will dry well and what oth­er flow­ers to use that are already in a dried state to add to wreaths.

We are see­ing a lot more dec­o­ra­tion going on start­ing in ear­ly Octo­ber with a fall focus. So, what bet­ter time than to go for a hike and pick out some found items to trans­form them into a beau­ti­ful wreath?

Flower Duet is offer­ing three wreath-mak­ing class­es in Decem­ber that will be focused on a vari­ety of pine and ever­green foliage. We’ll also focus on how to cre­ate gar­lands so these class­es will be all-in-one hol­i­day dec­o­rat­ing workshops!

Kit’s friend Hei­di holds up her first fall wreath cre­at­ed with Kit’s instruc­tion. This wreath will dry well as we used ele­ments like Euca­lyp­tus, Limo­ni­um, this­tle and Scabiosa pods in the design.

Kit cut some olive branch­es from our tree and then added dried Cras­pe­dia left from a wed­ding we did last month and pep­per berries for­aged near­by to make this fresh wreath that will dry well. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Olive branch­es look great on the front and back­side of the leaves and make a fan­tas­tic green­ery choice in a fall wreath. Cras­pe­dia offer a great way to add bright col­or that will dry well in the wreath. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Palm fronds may not be a fall flower item, but they are read­i­ly avail­able in Los Ange­les. This 6‑foot-plus wreath is as large as a door and is accent­ed by Mon­stera leaves. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Dried euca­lyp­tus bark and seed­pods make up this sim­ple rus­tic square wreath that is a per­fect accent to fall and win­ter. By using a flat square wreath frame, Kit attached the bark with gold boul­lion wire and then tucked in the seed­pods and branch­es. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

A liv­ing suc­cu­lent wreath is always a great bet for fall as the weath­er cools. Plan on mak­ing one in Sep­tem­ber to have it root into the moss in time to hang for the hol­i­days. We’ll be teach­ing this class again at The Hunt­ing­ton Library in Feb­ru­ary! Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Kit of Flower Duet made this wreath out of real leaves for the South Coast Botan­ic Gar­den flo­ral styling class dis­play. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

DIY Air Plant Holiday Wreath: How To Instructions

Create your own Tillandsia wreath as holiday décor, a new ornament option or gift idea!

Flower Duet has been cre­at­ing a lot of fun arrange­ments using Air Plants (Tilland­sia). Kit had an idea to cre­ate a liv­ing wreath with some alu­minum wire. Local­ly-grown air plants from Tor­rance, a few miles from our stu­dio, make a per­fect gift for the hol­i­days. Here are the how-to instruc­tions to make your own liv­ing wreath!

Moss and wire make a great wreath form for these tilland­sias. Design and Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Supplies List for DIY Living Wreath

All of these flo­ral sup­plies can be pur­chased online or at your local whole­sale deal­er. Some items may be at your craft store, too!

• 24–30 inch­es of Alu­minum Flo­ral Wire
• 3–4 yards of Boul­lion Wire
• 2 clumps of Rein­deer Moss
• Flo­ral Cutters
• 1 yard of 1/2 inch wide Organ­za Ribbon
• 1–3 Tilland­sia Plants — Pur­chase direct­ly from grow­ers or your local nurs­ery (includ­ing Home Depot!)

Start with thick flo­ral wire made from alu­minum so that it’s easy to bend. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Wrap three loops in a slight oval shape and secure using an end of the wire. Take a roll of boul­lion wire to start wrap­ping a web of wire for the plants to be attached. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Wrap the boul­lion wire around the wreath form so you cre­ate a web. Secure the wire. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Add some rein­deer moss for a dec­o­ra­tive accent. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Secure a few gath­er­ings of rein­deer moss to the wreath form as an accent by wrap­ping it secure­ly with boul­lion. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Add each plant by care­ful­ly insert­ing the base of the plant into the web­bing of the wreath. Use a short length of boul­lion wire to wrap the plant gen­tly (so you don’t dam­age it) and wire it to the wreath. The two boul­lion wires will blend in so it won’t be noticed that it’s been tied on to the frame. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

The fin­ished wreath can be hung using a dec­o­ra­tive organ­za rib­bon or vel­vet rib­bon for the holidays.

Tillandsia Care:

From Rain­for­est Flo­ra Inc. “The most secure way to water the plants indoors is to sub­merge them for a twelve hour peri­od in “good” water, that is, water that is low in dis­solved solids and salts. Rain water and bot­tled drink­ing water are the best. When the plants are under water for this length of time they have enough water avail­abil­i­ty for a long enough peri­od of time to com­plete­ly rehy­drate. A soak­ing in this man­ner should suf­fice for ten days to two weeks in aver­age conditions.”

Foraging for Wreath Materials

Here is a col­lec­tion of cut and for­aged green­ery and berries from the fall sea­son. Ask per­mis­sion before for­ag­ing from pri­vate prop­er­ty! Pick­ing up falling pods and seeds a best prac­tice as opposed to cut­ting from live plants.

Hav­ing a vari­ety of wreath forms is the best way to use the prop­er frame for all for­aged, pur­chased and found mate­ri­als. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

Here are some of the items we used in the pri­vate wreath class with Kit’s friend. NOTE: Glue guns are great tools to use when adding dried mate­ri­als like Lotus pods to fin­ished wreaths. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

2018 Floral Design Classes Announced

Flower Duet’s line­up for 2018 is here. Mark your cal­en­dars and we look for­ward to see­ing you! If you want to learn a spe­cif­ic skill or tech­nique, we offer pri­vate lessons for one per­son, or you can cater a class to your own group!

Pink Bridal Bou­quets by Flower Duet. Pho­to by: @katrinajaynephoto

Flower Duet’s Flo­ral Design Class­es at our South Bay Stu­dio in Torrance[/box_header][box_content]

Sat­ur­day Work­shop Dates with Option­al Tour of the LA Flower Dis­trict avail­able same Day:
Jan­u­ary 20, 2018 – Win­ter Ice Flo­ral Design Workshop
Feb­ru­ary 24, 2018 – Hot Tulips Workshop
March 24, 2018 – Emer­alds and Dia­monds Flo­ral Workshop
April 21, 2018 – Sim­ply Sump­tu­ous Ranun­cu­lus Design Workshop
May 19, 2018 – Amaz­ing Anemones Flo­ral Design Class
June 2, 2018 – Cit­rus & Flo­rals Workshop
July 21, 2018 – Col­or Sum­mer Extrav­a­gan­za Flo­ral Design Workshop
August 11, 2018 – Alaskan Peonies Flower Workshop
Sep­tem­ber 26, 2018 – Fifth Sea­son Flow­ers Workshop
Octo­ber 13, 2018 – Flower Pump­kins & Suc­cu­lent Pump­kins Class
Novem­ber 17, 2018 – Autumn Branch­es and Berries Flo­ral Workshop
Decem­ber 8, 2018 – Hand-Made Wreaths and Gar­lands Class

Wednes­day Night Wed­ding Series Workshops:

Jan­u­ary 24, 2018 – Bou­quet & Boutonniere
Feb­ru­ary 28, 2018 – Wed­ding Cen­ter­pieces & Table Accents
May 23, 2018 – Bou­quet & Boutonniere
June 13, 2018 – Wed­ding Cen­ter­pieces & Table Accents
Sep­tem­ber 26, 2018 – Bou­quet & Boutonniere
Octo­ber 24, 2018 – Wed­ding Cen­ter­pieces & Table Accents

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Floral Design Book Recommendation: In Full Flower: Inspired by Floral’s New Creatives

by Gem­ma Ingalls and Andrew Ingalls

Look­ing for a cof­fee table book for a Christ­mas gift for a flower-lov­ing friend? Here is one for the mod­ern age! In Full Flower: Inspired by Flo­ral’s New Cre­atives is a great pick for the mod­ern flo­ral art lover. We love that it embraces the design­ers who love green­ery and a play­ful sym­me­try. This is for the new flo­ral design­er and the new­ly inspired, too! Enjoy!

From Ama­zon:

“In Full Flower is a com­pi­la­tion of a new wave in con­tem­po­rary flo­ral design, fea­tur­ing artists who com­bine tra­di­tion­al tech­niques with an organ­ic, free-form, “back-to-nature” style. The oppo­site of but­toned-up and man­i­cured arrange­ments, this sur­vey includes over twen­ty of the most cel­e­brat­ed and influ­en­tial artists across the Unit­ed States who are rewrit­ing the rules of flo­ral design.

In Full Flower is the first overview of artists work­ing in this aes­thet­ic. Gor­geous pho­tographs depict the artists’ process as well as final designs, cap­tured both as still lifes and envi­ron­ments. In addi­tion, the wan­der­lust-induc­ing gar­dens and inspired inte­ri­ors exhib­it both rus­tic and urban eco-chic—simple lux­u­ry liv­ing embod­ied by these artists that all home­own­ers will appreciate.

With over 300 orig­i­nal col­or images and short writ­ing on each artists’ inspi­ra­tions and philoso­phies, this spec­tac­u­lar­ly inspir­ing flo­ral sur­vey will be trea­sured by lovers of beau­ti­ful flow­ers and inte­ri­ors alike.”

Floral Design Tool: Cardette Holder

Tra­di­tion­al Floristry Cardette Hold­ers look like fun­ny plas­tic forks on long sticks.

Cardette hold­ers are tra­di­tion­al­ly made from a stur­dy clear plas­tic that look like fun­ny forks.

Bam­boo Cardette hold­er found at FSS.com by Kit. Pho­to by Kit Wertz

They are a flo­ral tool designed to stick eas­i­ly into an arrange­ment made from foam or a vase, in which a card is placed for the recip­i­ent of the deliv­ered flowers.

We do a few spe­cial deliv­er­ies to offices and homes, so these are a good tool to have on hand at our stu­dio, but we like to use a few spe­cial kind of unique “cardette hold­ers” for our clients and students!

We are teach­ing a lot of class­es and it can be chal­leng­ing to keep track of who did each arrange­ment. We often sup­ply a card hold­er so each stu­dent is able to label his or her design.

Two twists on an old theme

The nat­ur­al “twist” of a cardette hold­er Kit found at Flo­ral Sup­ply Syn­di­cate on Wall Street in Los Ange­les are bam­boo card hold­ers. These offer a fun and organ­ic look to flo­ral designs to hold the card.

Anoth­er mod­ern “twist” for a cardette hold­er is from a friend in the flo­ral trade, Kate Daniel of Stems in Palos Verdes Estates. She is a tru­ly tal­ent­ed design­er with a fan­tas­tic flo­ral stall and uses alu­minum flo­ral wire to design her own unique cardette holders.

This cardette hold­er was inspired by our friend Kate of Stems. She makes her own card hold­ers from alu­minum flo­ral wire! The beau­ty of this idea is that the col­or of the wire can com­ple­ment the flo­ral design! Kit made this one. Pho­to by Kit Wertz.

There are lots of wires to use for cardette hold­ers! We have a large col­lec­tion of wire at our stu­dio. A good choice to start would be to get gold and sil­ver. They would be nice neu­tral colors.

You can pur­chase wires and cardette hold­ers from most flo­ral sup­ply stores or online.

There are a pletho­ra of col­ors of alu­minum wire that can be used to cre­ate your own unique cardette hold­er. Pho­to by Kit Wertz.

FSS.com has a col­lec­tion of bam­boo cardette hold­ers. Pho­to by Kit Wertz