Sustainable Floristry Course

An exciting new short course, discovering all about Sustainable Floristry. An opportunity to practise your new skills and take home a beautiful and unique arrangement of blooms in your own vase.

Bring along your favourite vase and make your own beautiful arrangement using fresh, seasonal flowers grown at Outbloom Flower Farm, just down the hill from Denmark Farm.

You have a choice of either a big bucket or smaller bucket of flowers to arrange picked fresh from the flower farm that morning. Please let us know which you prefer at the time of booking.

We’ll also forage a bit around the Denmark Farm gardens for greenery and other interesting elements to add to the display. Once we’ve gathered our materials, we’ll learn some techniques for how to prepare the flowers for the longest life in the vase, putting together a pleasing composition, and some mechanics of how to get the flowers to look how you want them to. 

Along the way, we’ll discuss why it is important to think about the provenance of flowers you enjoy and the materials you use to display them. Unfortunately the commercial flower industry does not have a great track record with environmental or social impact and in many cases is quite damaging. The good news is that there are an ever growing number of options for enjoying flowers in a way that is more caring to people and the planet.

What we will cover:

1. Short talk about why practising sustainable floristry is important: carbon cost, environmental cost, social cost, resource usage, single use and microplastics waste. 
2. Forage for greenery and interesting flowers available at Denmark Farm. 
3. Demonstrate conditioning prep for woodies and anything else we find. Talk about how flowers I bring have been conditioned and the things to look out for when you have to condition your own. 
4. Set up mechanics if needed for an arrangement. Chicken wire with tape. Talk about other options: kenzan, moss, agriwool. 
5. Arrange. 
   1. Start with greenery framework and trailing
   2. Add focals
   3. Fill in with supporting
   4. Finish off with textural flourishes

Tutor: John Iacona from Outbloom Flower Farm

Fee: £30 per person.

Flowers and materials are extra and paid for with cash or by card on the day. Please choose in advance from either a large bucket or small bucket of cut flowers to work with plus all extra materials required.

Materials costs: Large bucket/vase – £30 or Smaller bucket/vase – £20 per person

PLUS + £5 Sundries: (wire, tape, etc.)

As a guide approximate dimensions for the large vase would be 22x14cm and small vase 18x10cm

There will be maximum of 10 participants.

Click here to read our terms and conditions of booking

You may also be interested in other creative workshops at Denmark Farm. Please see our events calendar for our full list.