In my Bloomin’ News cov­er arti­cle in May 2021 on the cur­rent dried flower trend in flo­ral design, I offer a few tips on how to design with dried flow­ers and how to make your own dried flow­ers from fresh flow­ers. I was delight­ed to see a new book on this sub­ject called Cut & Dry: The Mod­ern Guide to Dried Flow­ers from Grow­ing to Styling by a sea­soned flo­ral design­er, Car­olyn Dun­ster pub­lished in May of this year.

Car­olyn Dun­ster is a self-described “botan­i­cal styl­ist,” plant­i­ng design­er and gar­den writer. She began her career as a jour­nal­ist and stud­ied at the Inch­bald Gar­den Design School in Lon­don and trained with florist Jane Pack­er. She is the author of Urban Flow­ers (Frances Lin­coln, 2017).

Cut and Dry Instagram

From Ama­zon:

Learn how to make styl­ish dried flo­ral designs that will last longer than fresh­ly cut bouquets.

Do you adore hav­ing flow­ers around the house but they always seem to wilt and fall to pieces as soon as you place them in water? No longer! Join the trend of DIY dry­ing and cre­ate stun­ning bou­quets that will out­last fresh cuts while still adding that soft, roman­tic flo­ral touch.

Expert florist Car­olyn Dun­ster breathes new life into the age-old art of grow­ing, dry­ing, and dis­play­ing blooms in ways that will bring a chic, nat­ur­al vibe to any room. Whether you are look­ing for ele­gant DIY bridal arrange­ments or try­ing to add a lit­tle bohemi­an flair to a room’s décor, there are dried designs that will com­ple­ment every aes­thet­ic and occasion.

Writ­ten for a new, younger audi­ence that is just dis­cov­er­ing the art of dry­ing flow­ers and from a pop­u­lar British botan­i­cal styl­ist with a pen­chant for urban gar­den­ing, this book is a mod­ern spin on a clas­sic craft. For those who are con­cerned with envi­ron­men­tal impact, dried flow­ers are also gain­ing pop­u­lar­i­ty as a more sus­tain­able approach to floristry.

Dried flow­ers are per­fect for:

• DIY bridal bou­quets and table arrangements
• Styl­ish home décor
• Spruc­ing up your place of busi­ness in an afford­able, low main­te­nance way

This book is an ide­al pur­chase for any­one want­i­ng to get start­ed with the art of grow­ing and dry­ing flow­ers. Learn how to grow your own stems and the best com­bi­na­tions of col­or and tex­ture to cre­ate flo­ral sculp­tures that breathe new life into any space in any season.

Her book Urban Flow­ers that was pub­lished in 2017 is a great inspi­ra­tion to start a gar­den of any size whether you have a small deck or a large yard.

Urban Flowers