Summary
This lavishly photographed book from renowned floral designer Ariella Chezar provides step-by-step instructions for 39 seasonal floral arrangements and projects that celebrate the splendor of flowers, the bounty of the changing seasons, and the wild beauty of nature in your home.
Just as fruits and vegetables taste best when they are harvested locally and seasonally, flowers that are picked close to home and at their peak reflect a true connection to time and place. Nature does not deliver its harvest all at once--each season has its stars and Ariella Chezar, author of The Flower Workshop, shows you how to make the most of them. Seasonal Flower Arranging follows Mother Nature's lead to create dazzling arrangements from the distinctive gifts of the changing seasons, from a charming spring bouquet for Mother's Day to a bold garland for a summer wedding, and from a bounteous Thanksgiving table to a wintery holiday wreath. There are arrangements for seasonal holidays, special occasions, or just everyday life featuring tulips, roses, peonies, dahlias, and other flowers that are easily found at farmers' markets, local shops, or grown in your own backyard. The book includes detailed instructions on how to re-create 39 floral designs, plus the inspiration and techniques to allow you to create your own original art out of nature.
Author Notes
ARIELLA CHEZAR is the author of The Flower Workshop and Flowers for the Table and a master floral designer who has appeared in numerous magazines, including O , Martha Stewart Living , and Real Simple . She is an instructor and artistic director at FlowerSchool New York, and has designed flower arrangements for the White House. Read more about her work at ariellaflowers.com.
JULIE MICHAELS coauthored The Flower Workshop , is a former editor for the Boston Globe , and has written for the Wall Street Journal , the New York Times , and more.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Flower arranger and florist Chezar takes readers on an elegant walk through the seasons punctuated by her inspired creations. "Why long for tulips, when the woods are filled with wildflowers?" she states at the beginning. Chezar arranges her words as precisely as her flowers, prefacing the instructions for each arrangement with thoughtful discussions of the flowers used and why they are so seasonally appropriate. Blooms should be used to celebrate the season, she writes, and the arrangements, from May Day and wedding crowns to autumn tables and winter wreaths, emphasize what is locally available at a particular time of year. The instructions are presented cookbook-style, with a list of ingredients and step-by-step directions. Chezar understands that not everyone has the time or inclination to find the exact branches and blossoms called for, so, for example, the "Cascades of Gold" arrangement calls for six large Chinese pistache branches, but also lists easily attainable alternatives with the same "golden, autumnal sheen," including oak, river birch, and zinnias. The combination of instructions, photographs, and elegant prose makes for a delightful companion for gardeners, florists, or armchair naturalists. 150 full-color photos. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
When confronted with hundreds of varieties of flowers, fruit, foliage, and shrubs, novice as well as more experienced gardeners dither and dally about arrangements. What's right for the season? Which is the best choice for different kinds of arrangements: wreaths, tablescapes, arches, and more traditional decorations? Artistic director of New York's FlowerSchool, Chezar (The Flower Workshop, 2016) has the answers and provides them here via four seasonal charts, elegant (and memorable) language, and 39 breathtaking designs to copy and/or draw inspiration from. From her perspective, why pay for out-of-season cut flowers (78 percent come from Colombia) when a wealth of options can be found in your own backyard? Tools of the trade are explained first, along with her creative method and recommendations for a cutting garden. Then the tome veritably explodes with color photographs of whimsy and imagination. All details are included (alternate flowers, directions, how to pick) as well as occasional specific how-to's (e.g., how to make a spiral bouquet). A pioneer in the farm-to-vase movement, Chezar will get readers arranging for an Easter parade or garden arch, an Indian-summer tribute or a Hanukkah table.--Barbara Jacobs Copyright 2019 Booklist
Excerpts
I am a natural-born forager. As often as I can, I will harvest the foliage I use in my arrangements from within ten miles of my location. I've hunted camellias in South Carolina, jasmine in northern California, and mock orange on route to a wedding in New York City. My rules for foraging are straightforward. If a plant is invasive, orgrowing on the side of the road (think grapevine or Queen Anne'slace), I'll happily do some "civic pruning." If what I'm looking for is on someone's property, I'll knock and ask permission politely, even offering to pay for my finds. Often, the homeowner is willing, even delighted, to make a deal.Because I believe in the value and the pleasure of growing your own, I've included a section is this book on how to turn your garden into a source for your own flower arranging. You'll find suggestions for perennial and annual flowers that are easy to grow, and you'll find a list of woody shrubs that will flourish in many a backyard.As with my last book, The Flower Workshop, I've included detailed instructions on how to recreate the thirty-nine floral designs includedin this book. But don't be a slave to recipes. You should consider mycreations as inspiration for your own. If you understand my philosophy of using tone-on-tonecolors, if you look for texture and variety in your foliage, and if you learn to forage in your own backyard, you'll come away with a point of view that can be applied to any occasion. However ephemeral, I see each arrangement I compose as a reflection of the world around me. I use the same color theory and sense ofproportion in assembling a bouquet that an artist would in paintinga watercolor. The great joy of my profession is that I get to immerse myself in the beauty of nature. I hope this book will inspire you to do the same. In creating seasonal flower arrangements, time and place are your first considerations. A tiny vase of muscari surely announces the spring, just as summer means roses in abundance. The dahlia is autumn's queen, and winter begs for berries and pine when Christmas is in the air. As to place, look around you. If you live in the South, magnolias and crape myrtle are your gifts. If you dwell in more northern climes, it's lilacs and apple blossoms that signal your geography. If your home is in California, lucky you. Chances are there's jasmine growing wild in your own backyard. Speaking of backyards, those of us who are fortunate enough tohave them can often grow our own flower arrangements. On pages 30-38, I've provided a list of flowers that will flourish in a well-tended plot. If gardening is not your thing, find a nearby flower farmer. Most farmers' markets make sure to host flower growers who gather their blossoms in the early morning and sell them on the same day. What can be easier or more inspiring than that? Whenever I'm on location for a workshop, I visit local plant nurseries to take advantage of whatever they have in bloom. This offers a twofold benefit: I can clip blossoms at their peak for my arrangements, then plant what remains to see it bloom again next season. If you have no access to a local grower, there's always the supermarket or, in some cities, the corner store. I am often amazed at the variety of blossoms available right next to the spinach and broccoli. I've seen more and more of these flowers labeled "American Grown,"which is heartening. But many are grown in South America, which accounts for their relatively low cost and seasonal variety. There's nothing wrong with a dozen tulips coming home with your weekly groceries. But for readers who would like to anchor those blossoms in a sense of place, I suggest you look around. It's foliage, more than anything that defines the worlds we live in. For example, I know my witch hazel blooms in early March, just about the time tulips are coming into the market. I often trim some branches and, when paired with just the right shade of yellow tulip, I have something personal, and local, to light up my dinner table. Last autumn,I bought champagne-colored carnations at the store and then while taking a walk, I spotted some golden fall leaves that complemented their color perfectly. The combination became the basis of my Cascades of Gold arrangement on page 150. I always grow sugar snap peas in my garden, an easy and early summer crop. Since they appear at the same time my 'Festiva Maxima' peonies bloom, those pea vines, dripping with fruit, become the foliage that takes a simple arrangement and makes it spectacular. Add a few branches of mock orange culled from a neighbor's shrub (you trade them for some peonies), and you bring the whole arrangement back to home base. Excerpted from Seasonal Flower Arranging: Fill Your Home with Blooms, Branches, and Foraged Materials All Year Round by Ariella Chezar All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
