SAIPUA

2012-01-26T08:40:00.000-08:00

(poppies, sweet pea, jasmine, lucedendron and ranunculus from this morning's delivery)

There is a film crew downstairs working on a film in our storefront, so we're all huddled upstairs in the office being as quiet as we can, sans heat. (The blower is too loud).

The show is about a woman who sets up a flower shop but the cops think it's a money laundering scheme. Exciting! I keep waiting for them to call me down for my cameo but they have not yet. I'm ready when you are!

Also, what if I told you Ryan Gosling is in it and is standing right below us...

No he's not.

Did I have you there for one second?

exclamation points

2012-01-25T12:55:00.000-08:00

(Jess R. this went out for your friend today...)

Blowing through day after day making, breaking, faking it...

Eric and I went to the NOFA-NY (Northeast Organic Farmers Accsociation) conference last weekend. Rest assured it was replete with permaculture preachers, male knitters, and women breast-feeding 4 year olds. Also TREND ALERT: tea in mason jars...

I joke!

We learned a lot. We had more arguments about soil structure and farm planning. I don't like all this "Year One, Year Two, Year Three" talk. At World's End everything happens in Year One or else. I've got a stack of books by my bedside that took more than an acre of hardwoods to publish and a box full of beekeeping equipment taking up space in my studio. I've got sheep fever. I've gone bananas for buckwheat. The free world demands buckwheat! The Japanese can't import enough of it for their soba noodles and it's gluten free and it grows on wet clay (our fields) and it's a great cover crop to revive fallow land and it's good for bees. And I'm ready to plant elderberries and start a niche elderberry wine and liqueur business! And I want to do it all with draft animals! And solar power!! LOOK NO HANDS!!!
__

In the world of flowers, things have been moving and shaking also. I went to an industry event! There were more calypso dresses there than in all of miami beach! I went right for the passed hor d'overs and chatted it up with cater waiters, occasionally forcing myself to smile just like we practiced at home. At dinner I sat near a famous wedding planner who did Joan Rivers impressions all night, except I don't think she realized it. So there you have it, I'm networking now.
__

In the world of Little Flower School, things are also happening - new classes posted on the site this morning; 1. a weekend wedding symposium that I'm excited about because it requires me to make excel sheets and handouts (good ones, promise) and slide shows!; 2. a second California class in May; 3. an advanced class in which we'll study the Dutch Masters; and 4. a sweet bearded iris class inspired by a J. L. Prevost watercolor. I hope to see some of you at school!

life, lemons

2012-01-19T12:45:00.000-08:00

Oh brother.
You know what I need to admit to myself? I rather dislike writing proposals. I'm not very good at it. I much better at making stuff than I am crunching numbers and slapping together moodboards. If only we could say to clients - we'll just make it on the day of the wedding and it will be beautiful!

And there would be no money exchanged because it's utopia. And in utopia you get all the Rachel Comey boots you want, in the big sizes that are usually sold out, and you get to ride around on a dog sled like a Siberian queen. Those dogs take you right to the flower market where you get more stuff to make more arrangements.

I'm off to Saratoga Springs tonight for a farming conference...who would have ever thought.

[This is an arrangement from our crazy day today - the soft white flowers reminiscent of daisies are Flannel Flowers. I rather like them. Thumbergii Spyrea has started to come into our market as well, marking the start of the more serious early spring flowers...]

For D

2012-01-17T14:48:00.000-08:00

Carnations from the archives!
Procrastinating!!

2012-01-17T05:42:00.000-08:00

I'm really freak-ing cranky this morning so I have to keep this short so I don't sink into a bratty rant

I made an arrangement for practice yesterday, here it is:

There are a few quick things I'll share about this little study:

1. Pink and yellow, not a famous color combination around here, but I was "inspired" (a word i find revolting this morning, jesus help me) by an unusually pretty bunch of poppies that one Miss. L. Lubell dangled in front of me yesterday in the studio. Here they are.

I had some lemons left from a memorial service (an event that I'll write about comically in my novel one day) and a smattering of frilly pink things. And a very sorry bunch of poppies that never really opened stashed in the hallway. (Associated, your poppies are 3rd rate junk or worse.)

Et voila.

2. Shallow silver bowl with a flower frog in the bottom. Even with heavy fruit this is possible without flower foam. There is really no excuse for flower foam. I can think of only a few instances where you need it, and a low footed bowl is not one of them. So bone up and quit that shit already.

paris, flowers from this morning, briefly.

2012-01-12T08:52:00.000-08:00

if it is the grail you seek...

2011-12-28T05:15:00.001-08:00

It's Thursday December 29th. I'm back at my kitchen table after a trip to visit family. Type-typing, toodling and drinking coffee. Hoping this bit of a sore throat is temporary, as come nightfall I will be embarking on an epic journey to Europe with The Professor seeking renewal, perhaps a brief awakening, a shard of illumination...STIMULUS!

For it has been declared that thee shall not take the same picture of ranunculus in front of barn wood with moody lighting forever! Thou art must break free from the asthetic chains of the 50 mm macro lens! It is time to charter new territories, let the search for floral enlightenment begin! (I bought a 28mm/1.8, Merry Christmas to me!)

Being in the last days of 2011, I am compelled to write - a reflectory of sorts. But I can't focus on the past so well. I spent a little time scrolling through the thousands of images in my iphoto and none seem worthy of summation. What is this blog about? Flowers? Running a business? Starting a farm? That all seems uninteresting to me lately. It's a good thing I am getting away. Nothing like a change of scenery to open the mind.

Words. We write them with so much coding, don't we?
What do I want you to think about when I write you something?
How do I want this to be perceived?
How do I want to frame myself, my work, my business, my relationship?

More words. Words Words Words Words Words Words Words Words Words Words Words

I am buying flowers. I am arranging them. I am making coffee. I am fighting with my boyfriend. I am lamenting the loss of a friend. I am talking to my mother. I am driving. I am digging a flower bed. I am checking email on my phone. I am feeling guilty. I am thinking about the end of the world. I am considering what to make for dinner.

Here we are, there we go. Time goes by in a flash. Everyone experiences the illusory quickening of time as we get older. But what if time is actually warping as the universe expands? As space balloons outward, why wouldn't time, the fourth dimension, also quicken in order to keep up with it? I think about my little niece and whether time for her as a 1 year old feels the same as time for me as a 31 year old simply because we live in the same time-reality. If my theory is correct, it would explain why people didn't live as long hundreds of years ago; time must have seemed epic! You got to be around 48 and you'd be like "Enough already!"

So we know we have to work quickly! There is much to do, and time is - literally - running out!

GOALS FOR 2012:

-Forearm stand, without assistance
-Write a book
-Start a dance troupe. We will practice in my barn upstate, and stage one performance in 2012; a small collection of dances set to early Vangelis. (I was very affected by the recent film Pina, thank you mom for tracking down a copy for me - but also it's playing in nyc now at IFC) Also, Deanna and Asheley, you are in the troupe. Get some spandex.
-Learn how to operate a tractor
-Spend more time with my little niece, Inez
-Adopt more dogs, at least 2
-Get a jaguar, camaro or other hot ride, not the subaru forester that everyone is saying is so practical
-Teach a flower class in Tuscany
-Learn more about birds and bird watching
-Throw a big summer solstice party (possible when the dance is performed?)
-Cook a feast of the 7 fishes next Christmas eve
-Build a teepee

TIME TO GET CRACKING!

Thank you always for reading always, for your inspiring commentary, for understanding (and sometimes not understanding), for loving flowers, for your amusement at beauty and interest in what I have to say.

Arrivederci mia ama!

*Any good thoughts on Venice, send them my way. We're leaving our computers home, but I may bring it to you live via instagram. Otherwise I'll be back with armloads of inspirational tidbits around the 15th.

deep thoughts.

2011-12-22T13:47:00.000-08:00

tending shop at Saipua today, all my girls have flown the coop for the holiday. I get to listen to all the music I want to instead of the 24 hour robyn-a-thon that happens when they are around. i miss them though.

maybe it's the holiday season that makes me get all Hegelian, but do you think there is a difference between good and bad people? this is something i consider a lot. i wish I could see things in grey, but I tend to be a black and white type. all or nothing.

surely we've all encountered haters, takers, selfish folks...but do you think that there are people who lack the ability to express selfless compassion?
if you do, here's some words of wisdom for you:
CUT 'EM OFF!

HOLIDAZE

2011-12-19T06:39:00.001-08:00

Reminding you that we are open all week Monday-Friday from noon-6pm. Stocked with wreaths, candles, soaps, fun tape, and knick-knacks. I'm heading upstate with the Professor and Nea to do some sheet mulching for what will become our forest hellebore/fern garden.

Also - Thanks to all of you that came our wreath making 101 class yesterday...it was bananas! We had so much fun. It was especially nice to see the familiar faces of those of you who have taken our classes before...pictures of everyones wreaths coming soon.

2011-12-16T18:09:00.000-08:00

HIEEEEE
I was in Fairway the other night... (and for those of you located outside NYC; Fairway is a small tri-state area franchise , and there happens to be one located not 5 blocks from me in Red Hook Brooklyn. This mirage of food - what with it's international delectables, cheap olive oil, plethora of nuts and other sundries - not to mention a cheese section worthy of my attention 5 days a week - comes with a price. That price is not being able to cross the street in my neighborhood on a sunday afternoon when I'm just trying to walk the dog and have to watch yuppie mobiles from park slope and beyond terror through our tiny hamlet on their way to enjoy the same god-given right (for now) of shopping for groceries but must they drive 50 miles an hour on Van Brunt Street and must they careen their shopping carts down the dairy asile as if no one else is browsing for keifer? Am I ranting again? Sooo SORRY!!!)...and a toddler in a shopping cart suddenly blurted out "Daddy that lady does NOT look happy." There I was, just trying to buy buckwheat. (I have crazy ideas about buckwheat, you don't even KNOW!) The girl's poor father was mortified but I was suddenly enlightened - what a better way to remember to hold steady, even in the supermarket and remember my recent mantra: After thirty - always be smiling. ALWAYS be smiling. When you're in your early 20's frowning can be cute (I would argue that's how I landed Eric) but now a days too many grumpy looks are governed by gravity. Plus, I'm a Finn - we frown professionally and sadly are not known for aging well. Except you dad!!

This was going to be a post about how you should come to our store to stock up on last minute gifts. But really what you should come out for is to witness Eric and I getting along again after a fairly epic argument that ended with Eric sleeping on the couch earlier this week. It's been a long stressful year. Being in business with your spouse is tricky. My mother got me a book years ago called "Entrepranurial Couples." It's laying around somewhere. She asks me where it is once in a while; and I remind her that the author was once in business with her partner and now they are divorced. You think they would keep that off the liner notes.

Just when my wedding season rolls to a close, his retail soap sales skyrocket. We're on different planes. The stress of the season ends up coming home with us. Resentment ensues. We do the very best we can but it's not always pretty. I'm crazy about Eric, but I'm also crazy about my work and the result of that is complicated.

Where am I going with this? My head has been in the clouds the last few days. I'm not editing. But I did just book a flight tonight. Separate vacations. Tonight we have to pull it together and go to another holiday party. Good nite.

plant bulbs in fall for spring flowers, so I've been told.

2011-12-08T15:20:00.000-08:00

With the Indian winter we've been having (don't get me started) I've been able to extend my bulb planting into December. Which seems banana's when I write that down - DECEMBER - but it's true none the less.

Let the record show that to date, 2,450 bulbs (and 10 peony tubers) have been planted at Worlds End. A lot of those are fritillaria which are tiny bulbs and sure help boost the numbers. Crocus bulbs also cheat like that. They're so tiny; you just toss them into a prepared bed. Shoveling the dirt onto them and singing "Good Nite Little Babies! Sleep tight!"

Figuring out where to put all these little suckers was quite a challenge. There's a lot of soggy ground, and bulbs in general don't tolerate wet feet. It seems there's also a lot of VOLES and MOLES around these parts and - please do yourself a favor and do not google-image moles; especially do not google-image "star nose mole..." DO NOT...

I digress. You know the difference between a mole and a vole? I do happen to know because I live in a place where this difference comes down to the safety of 2,450 bulbs planted snuggly in beds I dug with me own hands and amended with peat and covered with mulch and edged (sometimes) with stones. Voles eat bulbs, moles do not. There it is. Voles are the real enemy here, and as it turns out, they are the cute ones. But cute or not, they've already chewed up dozens of "ruby giant" crocus planted around a mountain ash, and so those burrowing nocturnal fuzzies are going down. I'm not getting a cat yet - but I'm real fucking close.

Digging these beds went in a few stages; once we figured out where to put them we had to start digging them. Which is easier said than done. In children's books I imagine it's like: Shovel! Dig! Plant! Water! Bloom!; one step leads to the next in a sort of picture-book ease. The progression of steps I experienced this fall was a bit different, and came complete with spousal arguments (One titled "Who's fucking garden is this anyway?" shines especially bright in my memory as does "If you really loved me you'd help me dig this.")

Then there were the rocks. So many rocks around here. Which explains all the rock walls in the forest. This is what people must have done with their children instead of television; Go build a rock wall. Why? Because I said so. If we ever have children I have to make sure that all of the rock walls are disassembled, the rocks scattered so I can make them do that work again. It's good honest work. [Speaking of children, here's a great idea for your kids next birthday party; An Archeological Dig Party! Get 10 of them together in birthday hats and give them all shovels. Have them start digging for treasure in your planned tulip bed, instructing them to remove the rocks to neat piles on the side. When they complain that after hours of digging all they have is a big rock pile, explain to them that Howard Carter dug for YEARS before finding Tutankhamun's tomb, and how serious are they about archeology anyway? If anyone starts crying, quickly serve ice cream.]

Then there was the triumphant trip down to the Agway to buy mulch - in bulk - a notion which, in the spectrum of gardeners excitement, lands pretty damn close to ... ok I have to keep this clean ...
"You got a truck?" the girl says to me when I request a cubic yard. Oh yeah I got a truck...

A truck with a cap on it. And so the gentleman who was supposed to use the back hoe to dump the mulch into the truck dumped it instead in the middle of the parking lot and brought me a shovel. Do you know what a cubic yard of mulch looks like? It's more than you think, trust me.

So it went. Mulching is the most fun part, I could spread mulch all day and be happy as a clam. We'll see what happens come April.

evening post.

2011-12-02T18:55:00.001-08:00

We worked later than usual at the studio on tomorrow's weddings and then I went to the grocery.
Came home, showered, picked up my clothes off the floor, fixed dinner. Lamb chops, potatoes, garlic aioli. I really love condiments. Fixed peanut butter sandwiches for staff tomorrow. Look at email. Open wine. I am so exhausted that when I saw the wine was a screw off top instead of a cork screw I said a silent prayer of thanks for the bit of saved effort.

I've been trying to keep up with yoga, but had to skip a class this afternoon which makes me cross. Things get hectic exercise is the first thing that gets dumped. With the farm shit and flower shit I've been trying to be diligent about the stretching and massage so to keep my body working smoothly. Can't find a good masseuse. They all play it too nice.

What I really need this week is a sanitarium that specializes in revitalization and meditation and whatever else. Throw some broiled fish and jasmin rice up in there, some freakin green tea and shit. Have a specialist come in and take all the muscles out of my back and soak them in milk for a few hours. Un-kink them all, and then arrange them back in there. When I check out of the place, the valet brings around a sweet little powder blue 1981 jaguar XJ-S convertible.
Blinded by daylight I pull out my wrap around oakley blades.
"I'm sorry, but this is not my car."
"Yes Ms. Ryhanen, it is."

And then I realize it is. It is my car. How long have I been here?
__

*PS We've posted new flower school classes over at Little Flower School, and there's a free class give away - check it out before Monday when we call the winner. Professor Nickles and I have been zeroing in on teaching ideas lately. Next to be announced is a weekend warrior weddings 101 class (a two-day extravaganza geared towards people looking to expand and hone their wedding work) and a freaking nut-zo class at Garden Valley Rose Farm in California. So stay tuned for those...Hey - I hope you have a really lovely weekend.

in which www.saipua.blogspot.com becomes a home renovation blog

2011-11-30T16:00:00.000-08:00

At some point I had envisioned a formal portrait of us in front of our house. You know...real stoic and shit. We might get around to it one day. That fantasy was followed by pictures of me in a fields of flowers I had grown myself, snip-snipping, but pictures like that require too much effort to stage. It seems life blows by while you're desperately trying to set shit like that up. Maybe one thing I've started to understand about farming - in the microsecond we've been at it - is that time is of the essence.

But more on the gardening part another time. Tonight, we talk plaster. But Wait! Safety first! Cue the plaster-removal-hazmat-suit-striptease please!!!

So in a time before sheet rock, or even the time when a contractor was a person you could call for such matters; people used to mix gypsum dust with water and horse hair and then slather it over thin parallel strips of wood called lath to make walls. Bear with me, I'm learning.

Through a quick series of events it became clear to us that if we wanted to really "fix up" our little money pit (and this is where we shrink down to micro type - and if you're already bored with the direction of this post, as someone like myself may have been in the not too distant past, than please skip ahead. Lets play choose you're own adventure! ready?

You fall into a property with a 200 year old greek revival that has never been renovated. To be clear; Ever. A reputable contractor advises you to tear it down and put up a module. A second opinion lands you with a builder named Ivan who strikes you as so trustworthy, so right as rain, it's rather off-putting. (Read: NYC Contractors) Anyway Ivan... he throws around practically pornographic series of words like "wood cooking stove" and "staircase to the sleeping loft" like there's no tomorrow. One thing Ivan makes perfectly clear is that the house will continue to fall apart unless you get all the moisture out of it - you have to put in a new dry foundation. Ivan is smart, and he talks about the house in terms of it being a "museum piece" which sure is neat. He suggests you pull out all the plaster walls and lath to relive downward pressure on the foundation for when his crew jacks up the central beams...

Do you follow his advise and run to Ace Hardware for respirators and a crow bar...?

-or-

Do you.. --- actually there is no other path in this story, so shall we just quietly exit this little game? Those books were always mildly disappointing in the end, were they not?

So for the past few weeks I've been orbiting between plaster removal, plantings and making weddings. On plaster days we make a little coffee, fry some eggs on the grill and then suit up hazmat style. We work all day ripping off layers of wallpaper (7 layers deep in some rooms), chipping away at plaster, horse hair and lath and hauling the debris out in (what use to be flower) buckets. We spread it through the forest in a thin line, the first layer of what will become a path through the woods to the beaver pond and eventually my walled-in secret garden.

It sounds all very charming doesn't it - and there are a few small moments that it feels charmed. Not the moment when a iota of plaster lodged in my left eye for an afternoon, or when we found a rapture of century old fly carcasses between walls, each of us silently whispering to ourselves "museum piece, museum piece" as we vacuumed them up with the antique hoover left in the house from another era.

We'll see.

night at the museum

2011-11-28T18:16:00.000-08:00

Oh ART! You're so quirky and full of contradictions!

Go figure. I used to be a part of this world in a different way - now I just make flowers for it. Which suits me better I suppose.
My father, who recently learned how to look at my blog on the internet will look at this exhibition - a retrospective of works by Maurizio Cattelan at the Guggenheim - and laugh. Without going down the rabbit hole of art critique - I will say that a kneeling statue of Hitler hung 30 feet in the air as part of a massive mobile makes for a rather challenging backdrop to shoot photos of flowers.

Anyway, we were honored to supply some greenery for the occasion of the museum's annual gala, and honored even more when Brian Eno, milling about prior to the event commented that the flowers were rather "tasteful." Deanna melted, I furiously twittered it, and we got back to work.

We even had time for a little stroll by central park; the girls appropriately suited in their upper east side attire, sipping $5 ginger sodas from Dean & Deluca. Thanks to the museum staff for being so easy to work with, accomodating and for letting us in to the after party. It was a fun day.

notes.

2011-11-26T10:56:00.000-08:00

Currently I am sitting in the McDonalds of Cobbleskill, NY. Looking perhaps a little bit like a deer in headlights as I survey the room trying frantically to hammer out a few emails. Turns out deer are the thing that most of the people sitting here with me are after this weekend.

Said my new friend Bob; "My son got a three pointer yesterday!"

I had to look 3 pointer up on the internet. From what I can tell, it has to do with antlers.

Anyway this particular wifi hotspot is the center of the universe for me right now, broadcasting to you loud and clear this anthurium arrangement from last weekend, clicking the McDonalds Terms of Access checkbox hastily signing over my life, my liver, my ability to remember decent coffee.

Actually the coffee isn't that bad. Nor are the people in here that unsightly. There are those McDonalds you visit where everyone is sick-looking and wearing the classic sweatpant/ haltertop combo (difficult to pull off correctly). Here it looks like a bunch of fit farmers and hunters in buffalo plaid with interesting knife holsters hanging off their belts. Which makes me feel that perhaps I'm in some sort of fast food time machine, but - check again and my coffee cup is made of state of the art 2012 styrofoam.

Almost December and it's 65 degrees here today. Among other things I'm concerned about regarding the farm, dying trees is at the top of my to-research-list. Need to start putting in Palms next spring.

Been working on pulling out the plaster walls at the house. Been trying to fix my bulb beds - so many lessons I've already learned and mistakes made. It's humbling but exciting. Good for me struggle a bit and learn new things. Collecting fallen timber from the forest for a teepee for Nicolette to stay in. Nea's been doing a whole lot of nothing, and I may be starting to resent her for it.

She knows it.

{Anthurium, one of my new favorite flowers, grace this wedding arrangement of forsythia foliage, astrantia, tulips, roses, ranunculus and fushia.}

Thanksgiving.

2011-11-24T10:31:00.000-08:00

Well, goodevening.

Happy Thanksgiving. Since that's where this rabbit hole has spit me out; we could start with that.

3:35 pm. My mother is making the necessary holiday preparations; there's a pancetta squash situation, a lot of sage being chopped. She makes it look effortless. I'm chained to my lap top; practically starving to death. Can't I have morsel to eat please? NEIN! She's german.

No she's not.

My father is in at the computer - last I checked - watching youtube videos of people crashing in planes. It's a festive day.

We break from our various projects to sample a pumpkin pie that came out of the oven first.

Now we've settled back in to work. Dad is out cutting wood stumps; props we'll use at next weekend's wedding. Eric is downstairs in the soap kitchen squirreling away bars for our Brooklyn shop. My mother; likely composing thoughtful yet firm emails to demanding wholesale clients. I bring her a cup of coffee after I finish peeling the potatoes.

Life just goes forward doesn't it? The mundane, everyday and the extraordinary - all lumped together in passing time.

Cocktail hour is not until 6:30, but here's toasting to you and yours this Thanksgiving...to peace where it may exist in patches on this earth, to my friend Josh from NASA who says he can reverse climate change, to coffee klatches, to roaming packs of dogs, to family businesses, to farming, to plaster dust and to flowers.

I've got some freaking neat shit to tell you about. In time.

Till then, you know what? You can bake the stuffing in the turkey.

october roses.

2011-10-28T18:17:00.000-07:00

I've had many moments with this rose bush in my neighborhood. I can't remember when I first noticed it. some years ago with aaron maybe.

a rose bush is a tricky thing. my mother had one in the garden when i was growing up. despite her valiant efforts it never thrived. gave a stoic red rose or two every summer. then it died. overtaken by bugs or mildew. i don't remember.

i'm not prone to giddiness. i know lots of people who get that way about flowers. sometimes i try to fake it, but hell - frolicing isn't my nature. flowers evoke different responses in everyone, don't you think? to try to describe to you how it is for me seems hard tonight. it's not that special... it's not overwhelming so much. and the funny thing is - when I'm walking home with an armload of these roses, cut with the kind permission of the woman who tends this monument - all i want to do is capture them in pictures and share them with you. i note the smell rather quickly, the headiest most intoxicating smell you can imagine. document them. consume them.
make it like a memory.

I'm going to take a break from flowers for a little while. a week, a month. we'll see what it takes. am i being dramatic? you bet.
my long hair is fully grown back; my leonid powers returned. i need to focus on things for the next episode.

see you on the other side, my dear dear readers.

from last Sunday

2011-10-28T09:01:00.000-07:00

And thus completes our review of last weekend - a big old pretty weekend of bananas with back to back events. We've all recovered and are already onto more pretty things which I have to show you soon...like some phenomenal last cut roses...

Saturday at Alder Manor

2011-10-26T16:46:00.000-07:00

It is just so beautiful at Alder manor, there are no words to describe it. Actually I can try;

You know the scene in the newer Great Expectations (which incedently, if you decide to watch it again it will be a major cringe fest. and then oh god, you remember how Clemente was your "favorite artist" because of this movie and it goes into a shame spiral bigger than the one you had in Urban Outfitters yesterday when you - ok lets just pop this into the first person - I almost bought a floral print crushed velvet dress. everything there is shit, which I knew, and was why I was avoiding it at all costs successfully for years but the bottom line is when you've been shopping deprived {see; bought a farm} and suddenly you find yourself in an UO {{surrounded by pre-teens picking food out of their braces and the [maybe?] stripper buying a feather covered two-piece hot pants jam}} with a credit card in you pocket.. all bets are off. some poor 3rd worlders will have a job thanks to me succumbing to the poly-cotton blended smells-like-teen spirit-pseudo-prom-dress I bought thinking i could use it for my halloween costume (think big ass floral head piece meets ripped black lace with a blood trail) {kidding!} {{not acutally}}). it was with regret that I bought said dress and then returned it only to find 3 other things I "needed." Had a big clemente catalog from the guggenheim show [1999?] sold it for a song during my non-consumer phase [2001] Must have seen the new (then) Great Expectations sometime around then)...where Kip wanders through Ms. Ditmore's (Anne Bancroft) overgrown mansion to find her upstairs in her boudoir sipping a martini?

If you remember those scenes then I don't have to explain my delight at arranging flowers at Alder Manor on Saturday any further...if every wedding could be this delightful to prepare.

from Friday at The Bowery Hotel

2011-10-25T17:59:00.000-07:00

evening

2011-10-20T15:59:00.000-07:00

10:49 pm
J Funk; point taken.

Caroline & Andy (rambling)

2011-10-18T15:56:00.000-07:00

What day is it today? Riding home from the farm (another impossible trip of getting nothing done. Unless you count walking from one end of the farm to the other, cursing. In which case we accomplished a lot. Nea, inevitably rolling in shit. Note to self; find a scat identification book) I thought it was Sunday - dreading the traffic we'd hit, but no it's Tuesday. No traffic, home early. Time to download the camera and remember Saturday's wedding; Caroline and Andy at The Foundry...

Bouquet in the studio. Loved this bouquet so much.

Bouquet with Bride. I refreshed the bouquets between photos and ceremony. Slipping into the ladies room with them, I had myself a little photo sesh. Not showing you those.

Adorbs.

Tables...finally buying a few ranunculus here and there again after their out-season. Still not the killer stems I'll have in March, but pretty non the less. We have our dahlias this week, soon they will be eclipsed by Anemones..

Made Caroline a killer hair piece:

Caroline's mother kept asking about certain species names so she would remember when her friends asked later on. This family was one of my favorites...

Now onward...we're marching to a faster drum this week, will keep posting as time permits.
Side notes:

- I'm sort of into dunkin donuts now. Be assured, I surprise even myself.
- Beavers build dams to make ponds so they can float their wood around, and to make a moat around their lodges which protects it from predators. Also, they generally mate for life. Except when they occasionally mate with their yearling offspring.
- Segue...Woody Allen is my favorite, and this interview was tickling.
- When deer gorge themselves on too many apples, they get drunk and wander into roadways making this a dangerous time of year.

Also, Caroline, I'm sorry that I wrote about your wedding and "scat" in the same blog post. Owe you a coke for that.

monday

2011-10-17T07:11:00.000-07:00

Starrett

2011-10-14T13:17:00.000-07:00

Sample meeting last night for a one of my favorite brides of the season...those powder blue clematis are so freaking pretty I can't stand it.

Today we're making, making, making for a wedding at The Foundry tomorrow. Kate Holt from Flowerwild has been in town sharing our studio which is fun like crazy. Plus we get to steal all her secrets and learn all about her L.A. Looks! If you want to learn too you can check out one of Kate's upcoming workshops...an intensive flower weekend with serious floral styling and business tutelage.

tonight.

2011-10-12T15:13:00.000-07:00

Our farm has a lot of apple trees on it. The couple who owned the property before us were true nature enthusiasts. Ken was an arborist. As we walk through the woods we find little flags he placed, marking new trees to keep an eye on. To take over a property like this is intimidating. I can identify lots of fancy flowers but am a novice at trees....and poison ivy, but that's another story for another day.

Nea is intimidated too. One night we heard what must have been a pack of coyotes celebrating a kill. Spooky stuff. Nea waits with ears on fire. Alert like I've never seen her. She doesn't know what to do. (I want my next dog to be a coyote.)

We sleep on a big inflatable air matress there. We cook outside on a grill, a generous and ingenious gift from my parents. The house inside is rough, a breeding ground for mold. Hundreds of varieties of mold. We used sheet plastic to make a shower curtain. I figured out the hot water heater the first week, a huge victory.

The lists we make of things we need is intimidating. Tractor, land grading, cover crops, greenhouses, another car. Physically, financially this list feels exhausting and overwhelming. But I said to Eric, we'll just take it one week at a time.

This week we have thousands of bulbs to plant and everything else can wait till next week.

Back at the studio things progress with beautiful, smooth, controlled efficiency. Flowers come in, they go out.
We're making the best weddings we've ever made, I say that with all confidence and knowing.
But I'm a bit tired. Tonight.
And I can be tired of flowers if I want to be.
We can't pretend to be enthusiastic every moment.

That wouldn't be very honest, would it?

(above are some outtakes from a shoot i did for a Once Wed post, see it here.)

2011-10-10T16:05:00.000-07:00

I like. big. bouquets. and i cannot lie
all you other brothers can deny
when a bride walks in with an itty bitty waist and a big bouq in your face you get sprung.

give a dog a bone

2011-10-09T16:14:00.000-07:00

Don't have a lot to say, except I've finally landed back in Brooklyn for a solid week and am so excited to be at home. With real internet. Because I have a lot of inter-netting to do. One can only attempt to google "introducing a dog to an electric fence" so many times on one's iphone.

Been missing the studio, even though our new studio is a lot bigger.

Miss the world! The city! You're looking good today! Looking good in every way!
Glad to see familiar faces. And by familiar faces I mean you Charles, at the cheese counter at Fairway when you're handing me a piece of tomme de savoie.

Glad to drink coffee out of a paper cup while hurrying to the next meeting.

Lots coming to you loud and clear this week my little flower friends...

Top photo; wedding flowers with cafe au lait dahlias, roses, forsythia foliage, snowberry, astrantia, tuberose.
Bottom: crabapple, kalanchoe, dahlias, amaranthus, "unique" hydrangea, scabiosa, oxydendron

Telluride, briefly

2011-10-03T11:18:00.000-07:00

There's one flight in and out of Telluride and it's on a god damn puddle jumper built in the Eisenhauer era with a picture of Willie Nelson the the wing. I had to look up Telluride on the internet a few months ago when Jill asked me to fly out for a wedding Studio Choo was working on. It's in Colorado, so you know.

Anyway, the median age of pilots flying the Great Lakes fleet (with service to Cheyanne, Clovis, Kearney, Pueblo and Show Low) hovers right around 22 years old, and what are a robust bunch! Prone to jokes about exit hatches "I'm not only your flight attendant, I'm also your pilot!" and "Ma'am you have to pull this lever and kick out the door but remember first to strap your seat cushion on because it's your floatation device should we land over water..Unlikely!"

Fortunately for me, flying exhausted and dehydrated and seated in the suicide row behind the cockpit, my pilot was a god damn stud with biceps that proved distracting enough. God bless the Midwest and their corn-fed sons.

Currently I'm sitting in Denver awaiting connection home, although unbeknownst to me, I am at the wrong gate. I'll find this out in about 45 minutes when we start boarding - and the woman taking tickets says to me "Did you bother to look at your boarding pass?"
"But the window said New York City...?"

I have digressed...Nicolette and I arrived in Colorado on Wednesday breathless a bit from the high altitude. Clippers, this time thoughtfully stashed in checked baggage rather than carry on, just a couple of freeloading-freelancers come to assist Jill with a wedding at Dunton Hot Springs, an old ghost town 31 miles from Telluride in the San Juan Mountains. Jill did real good and secured us lodging at fish creek a 5000 square foot cabin in the middle of nowhere complete with a hot tub, outdoor fireplace, pool table and miss Packman arcade machine. Rocky mountain high!

I have never been to this kind of place before. Anything I might say to describe the scenery will fall rather flat of the truth. The golden aspens (are they related to birch?) were on fire; possibly the foliage peak week. Mountain rivers, big sky. We met a gaggle of cattle dogs and a hog. Snakes, walks, hikes, 10+hours logged in the hot tub watching shooting stars. .

The flowers arrived, rather miraculously and we got to work. The wedding was beautiful, a small golden gem of a weekend for the couple and 60 of their guests.

I would show you pictures of the flowers but I told Tec after a couple of glasses of wine that I can shoot flowers better than him, and I'm afraid to get showed up. They were real real pretty, and you'll see them eventually. His photographs of this wedding are going to blow your socks off, trust.

Thank you so much Jill and Alethea and Annabelle for the infinitely grand opportunity, to see such an incredible place, and to work and learn from you. I can't wait for our next project together..

2011-09-27T07:53:00.000-07:00

Eric and I take a rare moment to walk down to the water together this morning.
It's so hazy in the city today. Sitting on a bench together I suddenly become aware of how quiet it is. So unusually quiet, and very very foggy. It suddenly feels like a dream, and I started to realize that I was dead.

"Am I dead?" I ask outloud.
"Yes."
"What happens next?"
"You have to go back to work."

I have been living in two different worlds. Fall wedding season and starting to organize a flower farm.

We closed on the farm just shy of 3 weeks ago. suddenly it seems that time expands infinitely behind us and in front of us. try to see back to the beginning of this farm in 1820. then forward into it's future. building a garden; a lifetime flashes by.

Go out to the barn. leave the radio on inside the house and when you come back it's still on, talking away without you. Some classical npr offiliate from the chicago area playing classical music 24 hours. Intervals of strings and news from Washington
Someone has set a metronome.
It is located the basement hidden in the depths of the oilburner. It goes on
It goes off

Our lives are changing rapidly. Words like muck boots, roto till, vapor barrier, bush hog are now part of regular conversation. We finish a big wedding in the city then rush up the thruway. Each day we're there Nea and I take a long exploratory walks; surveying our kingdom. 110 acres plus or minus. She's oblivious of property lines and runs after a doe for a mile or so in the wrong direction. Have to get her a neon bandana for hunting season and hope for the best.

I've been ordering bulbs for spring brides. How nice to have a row of fritillaria planted just for your wedding?

for Fallon

2011-09-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

Roses held up with fedex in memphis from thursday, arrive this afternoon. Most perished.

Exhausted and dehyrated...confused...disoriented (the roses and myself) we made something from nothing.
All is not lost!

big pretty & school pictures

2011-09-23T16:50:00.000-07:00

Wild grapes from the farm inspired this big messy urn of leftovers that Louise (stupendous intern) and I made yesterday for fun. If only all our pictures from grade school were this styled. Did you're mom splurge for the laser background? Mine didn't. We also never got to eat sugary breakfast cereal and I'm still working through that.

Going great guns gearing up for a wedding on Sunday...will try to snap pictures along the way.

The Colony Club

2011-09-22T16:43:00.000-07:00

We had the privilege of working at The Colony Club this past weekend, a stunning place on the upper east side. I ran into Ivanka Trump on the corner outside.

If you follow my twitter and bother to open any of the instagram pictures I uploaded that weekend, this is old hat for you. I love live twittering an event, better yet when there's heavy lifting to do. Eric rolls his eyes.

What I didn't divulge in the tweets was any details about the bride; possibly the sweetest most excited one of the year. At one point she told me she wanted to hug the flowers. Me too! I said. And the bride's mother...her overwhelming enthusiasm for flowers and our work is the reason I keep at it.

Many congratulations Thayer and Jay!

*a few more photos here. i sadly didn't do a great job photographing this, but the good news is that my friend david is making a video of our process based on this weekend, so i'll share that when it's ready.

jammin

2011-09-21T09:22:00.000-07:00

snowberry, persian carpet zinnias, pampas grass, roses, sunflowers, sedum, hydrangea, and double d's dahlias

you havn't seen anything yet! just wait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

happy times are here again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-09-15T13:46:00.000-07:00

Flower school is back in session kiddies, pack your rucksacks your backbacks your bag lunch your bookstraps whatevers and sign up
Best time of year for flowers is the best time of year for classes
Check our two new October classes out here
Also read about Professor Nickles over at lotte and bloom today

Now I get back to wedding work...have an exciting one this weekend at the colony club
And Porcelain Berry is here at last!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-09-14T10:15:00.000-07:00

A little wedding at Frankies 457 on Saturday with berries galore and figs. Is a fig a berry? I think not...on my quest for these figs I met with an angora rabbit - have you ever seen one?! and a thicket of mosquitoes. Also I recently found an incredible source for Thai basil; so these arrangements were fragrant as well...we cut zinnias...just such a opulent time of year.

making all the girls cry

2011-09-12T04:27:00.001-07:00

This is the time of year when I just go bananas
Flowers are jus too good
I send everyone home and stay into the night, greedy with the flowers - making them just for me, alone
and for brides of course too.

Got to be selfish a bit.

Take that dahlia you deserve.
__
Sorting through the hundreds of photos from this past weekend of weddings and flower school.
More soon -

World's End

2011-09-09T03:38:00.000-07:00

I want to tell you all about it, but I have to get back to my real life and make some weddings right this second I'm so behind

All I can think about is buying fritillaria bulbs here - finally allowing myself to start planning the garden and it's overwhelming

2011-09-06T05:37:00.000-07:00

Labor day is my favorite holiday, the one I wait for all year

"Even better than your birthday?" Eric

This takes a moment... "Yes."
Eric: I like your birthday because it lasts a whole week.
[It should last a month.]

Last night we toasted to Labor day, the onset of autumn, the hesitation now whether or not to wear white shoes.
A cool breeze swelled suddenly around us in from the windows, in from the harbor. a big ship blew it's horn as if to say

Free at last! from Summer's stifling clench! from the long lazy days and people not returning phone calls
Auto Responders set "I'm traveling someplace far beyond your wildest dreams with limited access to email..."

Let me make the message clear: Get your asses back from the Hampton's, and lets get back to work.

*The photos are of echinops (globe thistle) from the botanical garden in Akureyri, Iceland. A place far beyond my wildest dreams. One year ago today.

remember little flower school?

2011-09-02T09:46:00.000-07:00

I barely do! Nicolette and I have both had tumultuous schedules this summer, and we've taken a hiatus from teaching flower arranging classes.

But school's about to be back in session - we've got a class up at the NYBG next Sunday that will be a divine romp through their perennial gardens followed by a hands-on floral class. A few spots left if you'd like to consider...sign up info is here.

Also, there are two new classes being released soon so stay tuned to the LFS blog for that.

Going forward we've been thinking about ways to change the format of the classes in order to keep things interesting, if anyone has any suggestions or requests, I would really love to hear them. One idea we had (besides taking classes to Tuscany) is to make a series of symposiums where we colaborate with other floral/botany experts to teach joint classes. I love any opportunity to cross pollinate...

The Perfect Storm

2011-09-01T08:05:00.000-07:00

It starts in the studio.
I hear Thursday that the 300 person wedding on Sunday upstate will probably have to be postponed. A fury of phone calls begins. It's off, then it's on, - Asheley and I hit the market Friday morning in limbo, camping out around the corner at the ace hotel like hipsters without jobs, waiting for the call from the mother of the bride.
She calls, and tells me they're going forward - that they'll try to get most of their guests up to the camp before the storm hits. And so it's on.
Which is good for us, since we've already bought days worth of flowers and grasses, and have a box full of california heirloom roses in transit. Although the idea of a weekend off is appealing (as is a house full of extra roses - IMAGINE!) we're in the business of getting people married. And to disrupt the momentum we'd been gathering for this particular wedding would be a shame...

We had to rearrange all our plans for Irene, instead of making anything in the studio, we packed everything up and drove it all up to camp on Friday. Making all the arrangements on site is a real joy - since they don't have to withstand trucking it allows me to make pieces that are more fragile, more gestural and loose. I really wish every event could be like this. The flowers were so effing good...but the streamers! A 5000 square foot streamer canopy transformed the camp mess hall into a real party! But as I look back at our prep photos it wasn't necessarily a pleasure putting it up...Thank god for Eric's engineering degree.

It was while standing amidst 50,000 feet of streamers that I get a text from my real estate agent that they were starting to show the farm to other clients. My agent, who deserves a whole chapter in my book titled Guts and Glory, says to me "Focus on what you do best, and I'll do what I do best" (heroic!) Half an hour later she has a verbal agreement from the sellers to give us until September 1st. Which is today, I realize..

Then we camped out and weathered the storm like a bunch of 12 year olds. 12 year olds with wine that is!

The next morning the mess hall had lost power. No power meant no coffee brewed. Someone in the kitchen mentions "boiling water on a fire" and "sanka"
This is probably the lowest moment of the weekend

On a big wedding weekend, regardless of the circumstances, I always hit a point where I start losing focus...I tend to walk around in circles just watching what everyone else is doing. Does that happen to anyone else?

In the dark I make the bouquet and personal flowers...taking them outside once in a while to check the colors...

Then suddenly the rain tapers and the light improves slightly, and a bus full of people pulls up, and there's a wedding. Our staff heads out. The Tisch's start, and I witness what is probably the most touching gesture of family and community support for a couple.
After this weekend I was in awe of Jewish wedding traditions...

And then there was a party, complete with a Klezmer band.

Eric and I lit the candles and then left to start fundraising...

Today, September 1st, we have come up with the 196,ooo we need to buy the farm. And I have things to say about that someday.

It's not quite over yet, we don't have a close date set - but I don't want to leave you hanging too much as you've been ridiculously supportive in the last few weeks. And years.

A few more photos on my flickr.

L'Chaim

2011-08-30T08:27:00.000-07:00

I have too much to tell you that I don't know where to start dear diary.
The last few days have been tumultuous. We made a wedding in a hurricane, we fought for the farm, we washed the remains of a dead animal off the dog.
The details of life, flittering by...stacked one on top of the other.

This evening I'm finally back in Brooklyn, settled again at home. I made a tomato sandwich. Eric and Nea take a nap. It's quiet here.

Thursday I got the sad news about Jeanette Ingberman, a woman who I realize I've been carefully modeling myself after these past few years.

To be around Jeanette was to be electrified. Over the weekend I've been filtering though all the moments I could conjure of our time spent together. How strange that after someone dies, the sound of their voice seems to sharpen and crystallize...

I first knew Jeanette as her intern in 2003. She would meet me in her office and we'd sit and organize her desk; I'd leave with a pile of her papers feeling exhilarated and honored. She seemed to me like a queen. I spent an afternoon once trying to find a florist to deliver to Marfa on her behalf. A few years later I went back to Exit to work as Assistant Curator, a job I'd lusted over since first moving to New York.

Jeanette had endless enthusiasm for young people and their dreams. Countless artists will attest to that, and I can too. When I became interested in flowers, she'd let me make big arrangements for openings at the gallery, and then tell everyone I made them and talk about how beautiful they were. When I started Saipua with Eric while still on the clock at Exit Art, she'd encourage me and ask whether I was charging enough for my flowers. And when she called me into her office one day to ask me why I wasn't doing my job at the gallery with full force, I broke down in a shameful mess of tears and resigned.

Of course she knew before I did what was destined for me.

She sent me a handful of encouraging emails in the last few years, often prompted by something about Saipua in the paper. "Love you, miss you, stop by sometime..."
I never did.

She always toasted to life; L'Chaim!

But the thing about life is that there's just never enough time, is there?

2011-08-25T20:38:00.000-07:00

all things pass into the night

bad news

2011-08-23T19:33:00.000-07:00

eric and I have been trying to buy a farm upstate near albany.
sometimes things work out, and sometimes they just don't. banks are frugal right now, and they won't grant us a mortgage on the land.

i've been dying to show and talk to you about this for ages now, but i've been superstitious.

i cried my eyes out on the corner of lafayette and bond streets today around 3:30pm. a funny thing; when you see someone crying on the street in the city its seems such a spectacle, but when you're the one crying you just don't care who walks by to witness...

this farm is meant to be ours. the first time we saw it, after a long drive, i peed on the corner of the barn, marking my territory like a god damn dog.

NOT GIVING UP YET

rooty tooty, fresh and..

2011-08-23T08:52:00.000-07:00

It seems our fall season has started already and I'm scrambling to make the best use of the amazing flowers and fruit that are available to us right now. It's overwhelming.

veddings, veddings

2011-08-19T11:40:00.000-07:00

How did I forget to share this, I don't know.
Our friends James and Jen got married at the bell house in May. Photographer Robert Sukrachand took all the pictures.

Weddings we work on for friends are always more fun. Lots of times friends say "just make it beautiful!" or "we trust you!" Love that. James and Jen wanted a rich, opulent Shanghai feel to the night. We played with peonies, oriental poppies, salmon amaryllis, nine bark, carnations, tulips, smoke bush etc...

Jasmine tea soaps were the favor...

Cafe lights; these make such a difference in a big space like The Bell House or at the Foundry. We all worked two weddings on Saturday before climbing a 20-foot ladder to instal these bad boys 9 o'clock the night before...well worth it.

I don't even look tired! That's how good Bobby is...HIRE HIM NOW GIRLS

The only thing funny here is how long Eric's hair is.

Handsom sons

I love when there is good dancing at weddings.

More from this wedding here on Bobby's blog.

i'm trying.

2011-08-18T05:05:00.000-07:00

I find Viburnum berries difficult to work with. Sometimes I ask Ben to cut all the "albino" pieces, the ones that don't see the sun, the berries that are hidden on the underside of the bush that color to only a milky-yellow-white. These are like gold. But his "guy" that cuts the stuff somewhere out in Jerse must have laughed at this request and I got a 75 pound bale of thick woody top growth - berries blood red. Blah. Did the best I could with it, but most of it ended up in the wood chipper. I lie, we don't have a wood chipper.

We've been "harvesting" a lot of different things from the city sidewalks this year. Queen Anne's lace, poke-weed. I like to find the pokeweed it in it's infancy, before the purple shows up. It has a soft lacy effect in bouquets. Usually all the leaves have to be stripped off since they wilt rather quickly. I encourage you to read the wiki page for this plant.

Our California garden roses arrive this morning, so I look forward to that.

It's raining again in new york city.

If I had a magic doctor I would ask him to take all of my body apart. Unscrew my head, detach my legs and arms, clean out all the joints. Hey! be careful with my right wrist! I guess I would have to be asleep for this..that's fine. Finally, all the nuts and bolts of me laid out. My eyeballs, the joints of all my fingers. When they have all been cleaned and oiled real good, I would be put back together piece by piece and finally woken up with some of that brown rice green tea.
Then I'd go to work.

grace

2011-08-16T06:01:00.000-07:00

Do you believe in grace or nature?...if you saw Tree of Life...it is still knocking around in my head.

Grace Jones on the stereo.

Still fighting boredom and restlessness this week.

this will go down on your permanent record.

2011-08-10T12:00:00.000-07:00

So it is true; there is a warrant out for my arrest.

A letter arrived at my parents house Monday describing options for my "safe surrender" at a Washington D.C. courthouse.

The details after this will be omitted, largely due to the fact that they become increasingly complicated, involve trips to the - god forbid - Department of Motor Vehicles and are ultimately mundane. (But I had you at that first sentence, didn't I?!) The bottom line is there is or was someone in the parrallel universe of 7:45 am December 30th, 2001 that used a name very similar to mine and my childhood address when arrested. A Sara without an "H"... really?

Identity theft - even in this rather minor, resolvable instance - is a bizarre feeling.

The upside to this debacle is that I had to cancel my Tuesday and head upstate to my folks' (the DMV in their town is like a god damn garden party compared to those in the city) and dilly dally around my parents place for the afternoon. The autumn anemones are about to bloom...a mystery plant creeps out from it's squat in an old watering can, and I found a nice smattering of bittersweet - inconspicuously stealing itself, still green, wound up in an old catalpa tree.

I love this time of year when August gives us a gentle reminder that summer can't last forever. The garden and its surroundings are in over-production, run-away growth. Edging just a little towards the realm of past-prime. A trained eye might detect the slightest fade. Here and there, a bit of rust. The rather romantic process of flora sacrificing leaves for seed.

To my stunt double; I hope you're staying out of trouble. And looking good...why not? But please don't steal any of my money. I need it all for the farm..

monday

2011-08-08T05:59:00.001-07:00

i finally made the zuni chicken last night. i welcomed guests into my 100 degree kitchen and made them sit down and wait for it. the extra special heirloom roses i had on the table couldn't handle the heat and were mush by the time dinner was served. had i known the weather a few days ago, I may not have sought out the perfect 3-pound bird, salted and sprigged the shit out of it two days early, only to have to roast the sucker on 95 degree day.
bread salad with heirloom tomatoes and currants

i love this zuni book so much.

zinnias still making me crazy at the studio. marigolds now too.

we did a fun wedding at The Foundry with Diner (they cater now, so if that isn't inspiration to throw a party, what is?) but had a bit of a mishap with wind and ceremony urns outside that I'll write about soon. never stop learning lessons in this business, my 5 years of weddings and I still say to myself, "next time I'll know what to do..."
___
(The top picture I really love. I've gotten tired of shooting in the front of the shop, so I played with shooting this simple arrangement in our dark hallway behind the store. I looks like a painting I want to crawl into it and take a nap, except as you know i don't nap. I've been thinking about making simpler arrangements. This has 4 elements - zinnias, feverfew, crabapple and asperagus fern - all locally sourced. The guys at Dutch flower line miss my business this summer, but the local material is vibrant beyond compare. However, before we all start drinking that cool-aid, I want to spend some time writing down my thoughts on the local/seasonal debate; because there are a lot of angles to consider...)

on swiss chard

2011-08-05T10:12:00.000-07:00

swiss chard, the champion of leafy greens makes into everything lately; i can't resist the rainbow stuff that's all over the market the last 2 weeks. i know people sometimes grow it along side their zinnias, which is an idea that I should like, but don't. you got to keep that shit separate!

perhaps my favorite chard fix is to sautee it with a lot of garlic and olive oil, then mix it with rigattoni and fresh ricotta. this simple combination introduced to me by russell years ago and which has been in my repertoire ever since.

same garlicky chard over bruchetta with or without the ricotta.
chard on a grilled pizza with goat cheese, mozz and an inordinate amount of red pepper flakes.
chard in frittatas.

incidently it's been a summer of frittatas around chez saipua, here we refer to them as "tatties" and they have served as an last ditch dumping ground for anything in the crisper. thinly sliced potatoes, jalepenos, garlic scapes and a big grating of all the cheese bits littering the top shelf. the frittata has saved many things from damnation to the compost bucket.

the key to a good tattie is the 10inch cast iron skillet, fearlessness with butter, and the tolerance to use the stovetop and broiler in 90degree heat. be brave and be rewarded.

1. lots of butter and a bit of olive oil, vegetables - saute
2. 4-6 eggs beaten lightly right in there after the vegetables are mostly cooked
3. 3 min later, just when the edges are set, throw in the cheese turn off the heat and turn on the broiler.
4. under the broiler just till completely set and golden in spots

perhaps this method is standard for all you suzy homemakers, but i write it down here for those of you, who like me, have been burning the shit out of eggs for years.
_____

2011-08-03T16:05:00.000-07:00

Spent all day traipsing around Manhattan today in meetings. Not complaining - I got to ride in a car and pretend that I'm a person of status. A hotshit powerhouse. Change the world with the decision to swath a room in gold lame and urns of zinnias!
Just allow me this, please.

At least my appointments got me out of the house. Yesterday I sat staring at the wall, considering what to eat for lunch in the most uninteresting way. Do a handstand. Fall. Walk to the other side of the apartment. Consider the dog hair-dust bunnies. Then a tomato sandwich. More staring.

As a child I had a severe boredom troubles. Threw a lot of tantrums. Wailing about how bored I was.

What can I say, I like to be entertained. Once when a promise of a trip to the mall was cancelled on a Saturday afternoon for really no good reason at all, I remember grabbing a small paring knife in the kitchen and threatened to slit my wrists. I remember this so vividly -- my parents sort of sashaying their way through the kitchen with coffee cups, glancing over their shoulders at my meltdown in the corner and then snickering to each other, sharing a moment of humor unique to parents. My rage further fueled, I retreated to my room to devise a more effective tantrum.

It pains me suddenly to recall the colorful display I saved for the occasional lost card game.

I digress.
It's raining; lightly but steadily right now; 72 degrees; 7:16 at 147 Van Dyke Street. Am I misusing semi-colons?

I'm back at the studio and my plants are all glistening in their relief on the sidewalk outside. I fixed that quick bouquet with some sweet potato vine, carrot flower, marigolds, asparagus ferns, kale...the drill. Shot it in the rain, not caring if my camera got wet, feeling thankful that this planet, in all it's distress can get it together to give us some gentle relief. And thankful that I don't have to haul a 5-gallon bucket of water (twice!) down 2 flights of stairs to water my garden at home tonight.

To be fair to myself, I did get up and make that there yesterday. The simplest rustic tart from David Tanis' book Heart of the Artichoke adapted for blueberries - a bit early for them, but I'll explain where I got the berries tomorrow.. Get that book if you haven't already, it's one of my favorite things to pull out and read over breakfast or if you find yourself unmotivated with a refrigerator full of someone else's old produce...

diamonds and rust

2011-08-02T12:48:00.001-07:00

time passes and most of it these days lolly gagging around the hot apartment

waiting.

cooking some, listening to a gaggle of donovan, joan, grace, peter paul and mary, and hot97. a strange mix, but it seems to be working out for me. my hair is growing fast.
I wish I could sing like joan baez.

i have been cooking a lot. eating a lot of vegetables. my skin looks good because of that i think.
been composting. been thinking about exercising. started to run a little. sounds totally boring doesn't it.
it is.

truth is, i feel bored with flowers lately, and i dunno whats up with that.
i do know actually, but i can't tell you yet because i don't want to jinx it.

the world turning feels so much bigger than the next wedding and i'm not sure what i've gotten myself into.

buying books on animal husbandry.

also i think i want to be a dancer. is it too late? probs

how nice to loose oneself in zinnias

2011-07-31T15:42:00.000-07:00

rather than worry about the debt ceiling crisis!
shane stops by in the heat of the day to bring us sodas, then scares the hell out of me with talk of $100 loaves of bread if things don't get resolved by Tuesday
oh brother!

oh but!...

what I was going to say is about zinnias and how I love them this year more than usual; I've come to appreciate how imperfect they are: the strange asymmetries, the scraggly gaggle of mishapped petals - often smashed together on one side or crisped on the edges. A real spirited flower it seems.

fresh to death

2011-07-31T04:08:00.000-07:00

birthday wishes from far away friends

picture pages, and on flower snobbery

2011-07-29T07:00:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned yesterday we've been laying low at saipua headquarters taking off most of this month. It has been great for us to have deep rest both physically and creatively.

Getting back to work yesterday, it was a big let down to see another shitty yelp review for Saipua. A bride we started working with and then had to decline because we could not gaurantee that wedding bouquets picked up 2 days before her out-of-town wedding will look good on the day of the wedding. Making sure flowers look fresh is an obsession of ours since a big dahlia heat-wave mishap last summer.

Probably we can can be better about communicating faster, more directly and efficiently. I'll admit that sometimes it takes us too long to respond to tough inquiries, or inquires that come in amidst a big wedding weekend when so much is immediately pressing. Most of the time we're just doing our best, and the bottom line is that our best is not always going to be good enough for everyone. I try not to take these things personally, but it's hard not too. Especially when someone writes us up to be snobs.

Let the record show that the only thing I'm stuck up about is finding the freshest-to-death-flowers and guaranteeing that we can deliver them in perfect condition and on time to every last wedding (both big and small - because YES, to respond to another yelp reviewer we work with smaller budgets too) that we commit to. Flowers that look as good - if not better - than the images I publish here.

2011-07-28T14:40:00.000-07:00

We've been working long and hard to come up with a new label for our soy votive candles; drawing and lettering by Eric and Asheley - letterpress printing by Sesame Letterpress (who I can not say enough about) these should be available on our website and ready to ship to our wholesale clients by the end of next week...

Tomorrow I've scheduled some pretty flower things to show you. After a much needed restful month I've got all my girls back in the studio and we're slowly getting back into gear with help from a package of peanut butter cups.

SAIPUA WANTS YOU!!!

2011-07-27T13:35:00.001-07:00

As Banana and I were planning our annual thank-you-summer-interns extravaganza it occurred to us that we need to get someone new lined up for the fall shift.

We're looking for one hard-working, eager to learn individual who can commit 2 days a week from August-October. The 2-day a week thing is important if you really want to learn everything about a flower studio. Must be available to help on certain key wedding weekends. Some fun travel included. I could let you're mind go crazy with that MONACO, PARIS, MILAN! or just nip it in the bud and tell you we're heading to the catskills in August...

If you're interested in hearing more about the apprenticeship, contact Deanna[at]saipua[dot]com with a resume and a little information about yourself.

WE WOULD BE NOTHING WITHOUT ALL OF THE INTERNS, VOLUNTEERS AND ENTHUSIASTS WHO HAVE GRACED OUR BUSINESS

2011-07-25T06:08:00.001-07:00

My friends Jenna and Chris got married at Hurd Orchards in Holley, NY on Saturday. It was one of the most beautiful weddings I've ever seen and Eric and I had so much fun exploring the farm and dancing. There were lots of killer picturesque moments of kids in wagons and adorable shit like that. I got real jealous and made Eric pull me around in one.

More pictures on my flickr.

get out of town

2011-07-23T04:03:00.001-07:00

Went exploring up at Alder Manor yesterday. This morning we're off to beautiful north western New York. Please god let it be cooler there.
See you next week.

Happy Friday.

2011-07-22T05:41:00.000-07:00

A simple thing I made to take home a bit ago. I love coleus so much - this is a variety called "marmalade..."

No it's not, I just made that up. I don't know what variety it is.

And I didn't take this home, because as I look around this morning, it's no where to be seen
It's not wilting in the corner with sludgey water stewing like pea soup as it should be in my house which is clocking in at a friendly 92 degrees at 9:00am.

This arrangement got tossed I guess. Where is it right now? mixed with other Saipua debris in a big plastic bag in or on it's way to a landfill to steam and putrefy under 100 thousand tons of waste.

It's hotter than hades here and I'm cranky as all hell.

secret REVEALED

2011-07-20T13:57:00.001-07:00

I HATE SUNFLOWERS!!!

So take you're "Blossom hats" and 90's era perfume and shove em where the sun don't shine!!!

*all of these flowers are locally grown by the every inspiring River Garden; and available Wednesdays and Saturdays at the Greenmarket in Union Square

memories of green

2011-07-16T07:22:00.000-07:00

been taking most of the month off work. living out of my overnight bag, traveling around and visiting.

every year this happens, summer creeps up on me and I find myself resigning to it. at last. like falling hopelessly backwards into a feather bed.

i feel very fortunate to spend so much time outdoors in the real world. nature; the crazy constant thing we fight against. but to sit in it and maybe to

to start to be pulled under its spell of hypnotic delights
some of which oddly get caught in the web of my mobile phone's instagram
go figure!

on awareness

2011-07-08T05:30:00.000-07:00

Been thinking about animals.
When we got Nea almost three years ago my main hesitation had to do with her dying one day, and how hard that would be. Selfish isn't it?

When I go to work, she wants to go too. When I take pictures of flowers, she's always trying to get in the damn photo.
One time we were doing a shoot here and she insisted on having her paw in the shot. Finally the photographer had to politely ask me to take Nea home.

One day Nea will likely get sick and die. She doesn't think about it, and that's nice for her. She just sort of enjoys the day. Panting silently most of the time, her eyes sliding shut until the UPS man walks up.
Then all hell breaks loose.
__
I can't stop thinking about Gus and this bit of animal behavior science:

"A 2005 study of elephant grief, reported in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, confirmed what experts have long sworn, that elephants pay homage to their fallen, visiting the remains of even long-dead relatives, and gently turning over the bleached bones with trunk or foot. Biologists tell of gorillas banging their chests with yowls of anguish during a wake for a fallen friend, of sea lions wailing when their babies have been mutilated by killer whales, of grief-stricken monkey mothers carrying dead infants around for days, of geese singing both halves of a duet when their partners have died..."

been to canaan

2011-07-06T17:12:00.001-07:00

Banana and I went to Blacksburg over the long weekend. We used to live there.

we both worked shifts at bollos our old haunt to make some paper ->

MYRA! ->

took over aaron's show at WUVT and made it good again -->>>

this is what 30 looks like -> looks damn good right?

went to a party at BJ's in Riner->

my old apartment ->

Some things change, some things stay the same.

[Here you go.]

one year ago today

2011-07-03T08:00:00.000-07:00

it was fun to work on a wedding with nicolette

snakes

2011-06-30T06:49:00.000-07:00

HOW IS MICHELE BACHMAN POSSIBLE?
HOW
HOW
HOW
HOW
HOW

from her wikipedia page:

Bachmann has charged that global warming is a hoax^[60] and has been a vocal skeptic of global warming.^[61] She has asserted that since carbon dioxide is "a natural byproduct of nature", it is a beneficial gas required by plant life. She stated that because life requires carbon dioxide and it is part of the planet's life cycle, it cannot be harmful. In a statement she made on the House floor on Earth Day, April 22, 2009, Bachmann stated she was against the cap and trade climate legislation, stating: "Carbon dioxide is not a harmful gas, it is a harmless gas. Carbon dioxide is natural; it is not harmful.... We're being told we have to reduce this natural substance to create an arbitrary reduction in something that is naturally occurring in the earth."^[62]

flashback

2011-06-27T05:48:00.000-07:00

SPRING WEDDING SEASON IS OVER PRAISE GOD!
I feel broken and exhausted. And so in my dumpy hot apartment under the slight breeze of a dust encrusted ceiling fan I revisit my old vacation photos...

This is the deserted beach called Playuela on the island of Vieques where in February I rolled in the surf, a solo interpretation of the Wicked Game video sans swimsuit...because what else do you do on a deserted beach?

My sister Jess and I collected seashells and washed up coral

We cooked a lot of huevos rancheros and drank mango juice

We saw lots of wild ponies. Just out there doing their pony thing

We explored ancient ruins without the recommended tour guide

Got lost. Ran from swarming wasps. I learned about Jesse's fear of spiders in a rather dramatic jungle performance.

We hiked out to an 18th century lighthouse

and crawled inside.
You go first
No, you go first

The view from the top and you couldn't see no body in sight:

We rented a jeep and jeeped around to all the secret beaches.

We borrowed some snorkle gear and explored the shallow coral reefs. I felt like we were in the Little Mermaid. Until we ran into a piranha. He just sat there and looked at us. Stuck to seashelling after that..

We bummed around in town, catching internet connections where we could and buying more cans of goya beans and bananas

I drank coffee in a hammock every morning and every evening. Watch the sunset over the hills.

Re-reading the Nin diaries, boring myself with The Castle, and writing postcards that I never sent...

quick post

2011-06-22T13:56:00.000-07:00

Found a half&half peony today. It's probably going to be the last peony week, which makes me sad, but I did get the first dinnerplate dahlias (which I've started calling double DeeeeeS!)

Also started posting occasionally on the Garden Design website; I'd love for you to read it. It's about my container garden. It feels nice to write about flowers and plants for such a neat magazine. I almost feel like a pro!

solstice meditation

2011-06-21T18:45:00.000-07:00

let it be said here that summer is my least favorite season.
we've talked about this before - i'm well aware - but hey, blogs get repetitive.

it's probably my scandinavian blood. my propensity for butter and oily fish has landed me with an extra thick skin, ill suited for heat and humidity.
don't like a damn thing about bar-b-ques.
could write a memoir on my experience with thunderstorms.

but turns out that most of the things I do love take center stage in summer months, flowers, fruit, vegetables; you know the drill. so i'll grin and bear it for a 30th year, waiting patiently for labor day.
making hay while the sun shines, if you will.

this morning on my walk with Nea (who, incidentally, shares in my distaste for the warmer months) I happened across a small parcel of happy weeds with purple flowers tucked amongst the evergreens. But what the hell was it called? We continued on, my mind painfully sloughing through my repertoire of plant nomenclature. Trying to extract something from your brain can be a strange, almost physical experience.

Crown Vetch! - how could I forget? i was obsessed with this weed for a few weeks last summer...it's soft abundant takeover of a marshy field...it's myriad lavender flowers. Believe it or not, vetch holds up great as a cut in water.

so the dog and me, we backtracked and I grabbed it up roots and all; dutifully filling my role as the NYC parks department's faithful weeder.

it is such things that give me small pleasures this time of year...when all the swiss chard, rosé and raspberries fall short.

happy summer, fools.

roses and escapism

2011-06-17T16:47:00.000-07:00

sitting at the computer in the dark, procrastinating. eric is sleeping on the couch and i'm alone and it's very quiet. it's 7:47 right now! like the airplane!
i wish i was on an airplane right now... to Italy! I would arrive and one of those guys would be holding a cardboard sign that said RYHANEN and I would go with him, speechless. He would take me to a fantastic sidestreet buried deep in...what city should we be in? Florence? Sienna?

...and i would get out, knock on a small door and be greeted by fabulous (but not FABULOUS like you know what i mean, ew gross) people who had wine in their hands and some kind of delicious cured meats. we'd eat and drink and talk for a while about relationships and flowers and life and then I would feel tired and excuse myself to my quarters which are small, like a monestary. a bed, plaster walls, a simple sink. i'd wash up and hit the sack!

in the morning? strong coffee, a slice of lemon-baked ricotta, and the keys to my scooter to go traveling.

[brian ferry you did it to me]

[I wish you all could smell these roses, they are absolutely intoxicating. if i ever said ranunculus was my favorite flower, i take it back and say roses now.]

Old Field Farm

2011-06-16T06:39:00.000-07:00

One of our volunteers this summer is a really superior woman named Cerise Mayo who aside from being a magician with Rhubarb, works as a consultant helping small farms get the exposure, help, funding, product placement, etc. they need.

She sent this over this morning, artist and farmer Peter Nadin's new work and products presented later this month at Gavin Brown. I am happy to read about his work this morning, and click through his website.

yarrow et al

2011-06-15T15:08:00.000-07:00

Never been able to grow yarrow, but love it. Fortunately I have a good source for cottage yarrow. It's not a secret; Bernadette from River Garden grows them and I feel lucky today for that. You can find her flowers at the Union Square Green market Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays.
The peach color is my favorite.

We're in between weddings here mid-week. I have not shared a lot of wedding stuff here lately, have I? Well here's a bit from our last wedding at Bedford Post Inn.
I guess lots of time I just don't have the energy to talk about weddings here. Many of these events take a lot out of me...attempt to restore my energy and enthusiasm for flowers with a little color study like the one above, share it here, bask in your comments for a few days :) and then go back into the thick of it. That's right I did just emoticon you. Weird, right?

I've been avoiding the computer and the internet a lot lately. Quit my facebook. Thinking of quitting twitter too...it sucks my time and I'd rather just look out the window than know who's boinking who (metaphorically) in the blog-o-sphere. but it's weird how addictive that shit is, we discussed this at lunch today. how you check those things 40 times a day to find out what's happening (nothing)
just a lot of borrowed images tumbling around. lots of cats self mythologizing in 46 characters or less, furiously licking each other... grooming one another
>:(

but then there's martha. twittering away out there in Seoul, now western China. her twitter feed is one of a few little gems in the rough and tumble of useless drab. so i'll probably keep on keeping on for now..
my twitter, my titillation

\,,/
this apparently means rock on, so there it is.

i just don't want the earth to keep getting hotter.

2011-06-08T16:36:00.000-07:00

[old stone structures on one of my favorite hikes with nea]

that's all.
I just want things to stay the same, and for the next generation to be able to experience nature in the same way that we did. but shits just not going to pan out that way and we have to think about it sometime.

saw the new woody allen movie last night, have you seen it? it's about time travel and is worth it for the adorable portrayals of hemingway, gertrude stein, dali, man ray... yada yada yada

but today, reading this great article in the OP ed section and thinking about the movie last night. i came to an interesting cross section in my brain; we have to let go of living in the past. we have to take the future into our own hands right now. what does that mean exactly I'm not sure. when I get wrapped up in thinking about the environment and my own contributions to the problem I get overwhelmed. let me tell you the flower business is far far far from green.

i've been saving tin foil. and plastic wrap. which makes me feel sort of crazy. actually i broke the crazy limit a few weeks ago when I carried an old bucket of flower water down 2 flights of stairs at a fancy upper east side club to the ladies room to flush the toilet with it. actually i was in the stall and automatically flushed without thinking. then almost I almost cried because i wasted the water.

sounds wacky, but shits going to get real like that i think. pay per flush sort of thing.
go read that article, it's more optimistic than you'd think.

and this is the most i ever want to use the words toilet and flush with you.

flinging deep personal monday morning thoughts at you

2011-06-06T08:06:00.000-07:00

I've spent most of my life feeling like i needed something else, you know? If I just had...

But the nice thing about getting older is that you feel that less. I can say right now I feel I need nothing more and this is a fucking huge bit of progress for me.

I mean.. I would like to have a house with a garden. And you know I want a copper colored camaro. I would like more close friends, and I've probably always wanted to be thinner. I would like to have a boat. A cleaner kitchen, another dog like Nea, time for yoga and cooking. I would like to not have a headache right now. I would like to cry more instead of being such a robot. I would like to be able to ask for things I want - just be able to ask - and tell people how I really feel when I see them and feel those things. And I would really like to travel more, especially to Petra this morning.

I have to look at my horoscope because in the last few months I've been feeling overwhelmed with a strange sense of compassion. Grand emotions I can't verbalize, even to Eric. It has to be a Neptune aspect or something else in the stars. It means nothing really, but everything too.

We are all our own little universes, aren't we?

2011-06-01T15:08:00.000-07:00

long hazy days we're floating through
but this is when things get interesting
i feel like kate bush speaks directly to me from across the room
it's uncanny

coleus, corydalis and clematis!! you've come at last

enough already!

2011-05-25T18:24:00.001-07:00

Just when I think I can't take it anymore, things heat up even more around here. Not literally - although our god damn cooler is on the fritz yet again and it has been in the 80's here - but figuratively - as in the flowers are just coming in off the charts. There is no time of year like now, and although I'm not the spring frolicking type (I'll keep my boots on in the grass and patiently wait for the autumn thank you) I cannot deny the excitement and energy I have for these flowers. I stay up later, wake up earlier to be with them. The tuning fork; struck. The vibrations accelerating!

So you have the bearded iris there. A fine specimen of natures awe-inspiring designs. Sexual. Let the record show that is a word I use timidly to describe a flower, but there it is I've said it. I know of few other flowers as captivating as the bearded iris. They leave me speechless.

And then there is the black lace elderberry...

also known as Sambucus nigra. A sight for sore eyes in zones 4-7. I've waited for it all year. In spring it emerges with rich black foliage and large flat, blush colored flowers. Berries suitable for wine or jam in the fall. And the most elegant cuttings for arrangements should you be so inclined to give pairing to your bearded iris, lily of the valley or early tree peonies.

The lavender variety of lily of the valley (convallaria majalis rosea) has a fragrance even more intoxicating than it's white counterpart, and though rare, is worth seeking out and spending a bit more on. I would personally would pay 15 cents a sniff. Consider setting up a roadside stand!

2011-05-23T06:44:00.000-07:00

Stopped the truck short the other day at the sight of a gorgeous bale of pink japanese dogwood on the sidewalk in front of a vendor in the flower district.

This particular vendor is located somewhat across the tracks, but it so happens that said vendor gets the very best local product (nature works in mysterious ways) and so once a week I hurry across the avenue wincing my way through "goodmornings!" as these guys crack open Budweisers at 6:30 am and hustle flowers with the maturity of 6th graders.

Market's got all types of vendors; all sorts of personalities. The mobsters, the sheisters, the preps, the sporties...I shop these vendors differently. Sometimes I work them against each other. (I said it!) But in the end, they all get cookies at Christmas. Linzers, remember them? Come to think of it I didn't bring any to this vendor, and I feel sad about that now.

"PINK DOGWOOD!?!"

"It's sold!" he said.

"Ha! right. But I NEED IT
INEEDITINEEDITINEEDIT!"

"I can make you another one.." he said.

And that is when I saw his arms were covered in red streaks - he had spray-dyed white dogwood pink to resemble the blushing variety scarce in the market last week.
I was horrified and it must have been all over my face because running back to the truck he shouted after me with a maniacle look in his eyes -
"Time to accept it sweetheart! We're in the fantasy business!
IT'S ALL A FANTASY!!"

So there it is. Now you know that people spray paint flowers.
We live - and I participate in - to some extent - a fantasy land where people spend insane amounts of money on flowers for weddings and events; parties where there MUST be 10,000 blue hydrangea.* And when the world can't give you 10,000 stems of blue hydrangea all in one week, you buy floral grade spray paint, shake the shit out of that can, and make the white ones blue.

*I guess, I mean I don't actually know. I've never sprayed a flower. Pinecone, yes...are you judging me right now?

____

The little photo shoot I did with Nikki and Russell is up at 100 Layer Cake.

The photo above is an outtake of a shoot I did for a client who is getting a floral tattoo!

long days

2011-05-19T04:43:00.000-07:00

You know it's wedding season, don't you? We've been gearing up for a long time. Pumping iron. Weaning ourselves from sleep and regular meals. I drink so much coffee, it's incredible. People who think coffee is bad for you?
FUCK OUTTA HERE! Mothers milk, sons.

I've been doing a lot of photo shoots also, Martha Stewart (still havn't run into her to hit her up for that $cash$, but have another chance tomorrow)

The Erie Basin shoot I did Monday with Russell, Courtney and Nicolette is so fine, I think you'll cry. Next week it will be ready. You can take a peak at Russell's tumblr.

Taught a class over the NYBG studio's last night on fragrant flowers. They have such a beautiful facility in midtown for classes, and we didn't really have to clean up, which still does not make sense to me. Still spots avaialable in the June and September classes, check it out here.

What else is new...we realized our flower cooler was electrified due to a short fuse and so we've all been getting dosed with 1000 extra volts several times a day. In addition to all the coffee, the secret to our success?

I write a lot of things in my mind to you lately. I have to show you so many incredible things; peonys obviously but also bearded iris are blooming now and lilly of the valley is looking so good...lilac, although this has been a bad year for lilac due to the draught last summer and the long winter. If you have lilac bushes, please remember they like to be pruned back right at the end of their bloom cycle. Else you'll cut off next years bud formation.

I miss writing here, and more than; that your witty responses. But all over this town brides are becoming wives, and through June that uncanny process has to be my focus. That and a few days here and there tending sheep.

Saturday, May 14th

2011-05-16T06:23:00.000-07:00

Wedding flowers.

Clyde surveys Van Dyke Street.

tell doctor flicker...

2011-05-13T13:09:00.001-07:00

peonies and young blueberry in the evening

need to reshoot this without so much grain i guess

lately i feel like i'm floating. I have so much to write down...but I don't even seem to have time to water my plants

who droop a little more as I run out the door.

what does the universe have to do with it?

2011-05-06T19:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Eugene Wyatt and I weaned 200 lambs from their mothers. A rather chaotic exercise involving a lot of circular chasing and hoisting little lambs kicking and screaming over a fence into a separate pen never to be reunited with their mothers again.

So went the first day of my new internship at Catskill Merino Sheep Farm.

As it was, last Saturday on a whim I stopped for some River Garden daffodils (positively sumptuous creamsicle varieties) at the Union Square Green Market. Like a mirage I saw across the asile a rainbow of naturally dyed wool skeins. Rather sleep deprived, and wearing acyrlic (the horror!) I stumbled over without thinking - mumbling about my dog, my interest in the ovine arts, and my willingness to shovel shit in exchange for experience. Sometimes things just work out.

I am very thankful for the opportunity to learn something new, and especially for the chance to be out of my element for a day. I am thankful to my girls for allowing me to split town on a nutty whim, leaving them in the wake of mothers day orders and the daily pandemonium that is Saipua. And I am thankful that sheep, unlike people, tend to forget the trauma of separation rather quickly, bowing their heads down to the soft sweet pasture grass that is rather elegantly dubbed the spring flush.

Happy mother's day, see you on the other side of this crazy weekend...

Free Flower Friday

2011-05-05T08:58:00.000-07:00

Hello! It's that time. Asheley and Deanna reporting to you live in the studio, bringing you our favorite part of the week: Free Flower Friday!

Comment to enter, leave your e-mail, we hope you win!

a waste

2011-05-03T13:40:00.000-07:00

[A little practice arrangement from yesterday with akebia vine, hellebores and pulsatilla]

dream diary;

First lets get the record straight; I don't nap.

Never a napper. Tried it a few times. Didn't like it. You don't get much done napping.

I'd rather have a coffee.

Which is what i should have done today at 1:30 pm instead of shaking off my boots and diving head first into bed.

Have you ever had a lucid dream? I've had them a few times; always when napping in the middle of the day. It's a dream you can completely control..

When you're lucky enough to have a dream like this it's generally advisable to find Clive Owen right away or take flight at the helm of a F14 tomcat. You don't want to be reincarnated as John Goodman and be sitting in a board room at Warner Bros. having an argument with your agent as I was today.

That's all.

little wedding at frankies

2011-05-02T10:07:00.000-07:00

from this past weekend. sifting through images today getting ready to redo the portfolio on the website. its such a long process. and i hate processes, i want everything right away!

tired of negotiating about money. money is boring!

i was at the Martha Stewart offices the other day, and secretly i was hoping to run into Martha herself. because if i did i would ask her to please give me $150,000 for some big projects i'm getting into. i mean, why shouldn't she?

2011-04-30T16:09:00.000-07:00

Did you see Nicolette and I in T Magazine this weekend? I think it's funny because we look like we're stealing the flowers.

Our blue palette class on May 7th still has some spots available...highly recommend. Flowers have been just so damn good as of late...I was practicing this evening a bit.

light a candle

2011-04-28T04:56:00.001-07:00

raise your hands up, clasp them and start ringing them

cause kids, the ranunculus is done finished

caput!

finito!

sorry suckas! you wanna see more ranunculus?

ain't gonna happen. we can't always get what we want

i'd like to see more elizabeth taylor, but that there is life

all cycling and shit

and I'm fine with it

see you suckas! we'll be moving on up to peonies, clematis, garden roses, dahlias

not looking back

grazing greener pastures

you're chance to win the last in the studio

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2011-04-24T13:49:00.000-07:00

we've been way up in central ny on a wild sheep's chase

now we've settled in with my folks to have easter dinner. above are some snaps of a centerpiece i just made from my mom's garden. her magnolia has just bloomed. we spent the day planting some new things; foam flower, heucheras, epimediums - all deer resistant, shade loving perennials; bless them. the ponds along our familiar hiking routes are thawed and the sweet perfume of these magnolia blossoms in the house is loosing battle to the smell of a certain wet dog who has been lurking about hoping for lamb scraps.

it's nice to take a break from the city

i type this to you painfully on my father's PC

enter the vortex!

2011-04-21T04:47:00.000-07:00

These ranunculus remind me of black holes, and all my weekends spent on the event horizon. Get it?
No? Well, It's free flower time and you don't have to be a physicist* to win these crazy kids. Just comment for a chance.

*Actually - I've been thinking and reading a lot of physics this year and I'd love to do a barter with someone who actually knows a lot about physics so I can ask all the questions I have. Wouldn't that be neat, information for flowers?

World of Inferiors

2011-04-18T06:36:00.000-07:00

I came home last Monday from two big installations; exhausted - hungry, with an afternoon alone in the apartment (!) a half eaten block of manchego and Babs and Barry on the record player. Let me tell you this right now; there is no better music to arrange flowers to than Barbara Streisand. You can argue this with me, but I like to think I know what I'm talking about. I got this down.

I had left-over flowers. A fuck ton of them. And so things started getting interesting, scarves strewn, ribbon unraveled. Dresses tried on then discarded in heaps on the floor. Petals dropping, dogs sighing. Remember I told you I've been trying to practice everyday..

This was all fine and dandy until the sun set and I realized the magnitude of what had happened; the mess was epic. As I began to tidy up, I kept finding more and more cleaning to do. And then I went deep.

To get the record straight - to give you a fair idea - I must admit that I have not really cleaned my apartment in 2011. Sure, the occasional swiff. The midweek dusting of the coffee table for cocktail hour. But a deep clean doesn't happen around here. I got other shit to do. Cleaning is for sissies. Like umbrellas.

But Monday I was on a tear. The sort that happens when you have been running on so much adrenalin and momentum that when it comes time to rest, to take some time off - you simply don't know how. Can't stop. Won't stop.

And that is how I found myself on the floor, behind the refrigerator scrubbing moldings. At some point I misplaced my rag and started using the bottom portion of my T-shirt. I became a human mop - a spitting, scrubbing, writhing mess on the linoleum. I had succumbed, slipped down the emotionally charged rabbit hole and entered the void: women's work.

Alarmed and disgusted at myself (who am I? why can't I relax?) I put on hiatus plans to clean the oven, to dust under the bed, to clean all the windows.
I have a pattern of working myself into the ground and then feeling exasperated. When I start to feel bad for myself, Eric does this thing where he puts his pointer fingers and thumbs together and pretends to play the tiniest violin. The saddest music in the world. It's a hilarious (sometimes) reminder that feeling sorry for myself gets me absolutely no where. And it's unattractive. So there it is. Dear Diary - I'm working on being less of a perfectionist and learning how better to relax in my free time. Which is why I just gave myself a manicure - a reversed french one...
Real women's work.

2011-04-18T06:29:00.000-07:00

something for you this monday morning

saipua update + free flower friday

2011-04-14T08:38:00.000-07:00

morning kittens! shit is starting to percolate around here
got wedding season brimming

got our first van rental of the season (always a sign of something serious)
got a fantastic crew in place, got annie lennox on repeat
got a new killer dress from caitlin
got hellebores to hoard, got watercolor pansies, begonias galore
got flowers in front of jay-z gwenyth and martha this week
got joelle coming out to freelance and make a million arrangements an hour and bring us pistachio merenges and lavender butter cookies
got a big spring fling extravaganza in the works for May Day weekend (please consider saving dates 4.30 and 5.1)

and got a free flower arrangement with your name on it tomorrow. comment to win
remember WE LOVE YOU!

in the garden of good and evil

2011-04-12T16:31:00.000-07:00

I had to go twice to the magnolia grove at the brooklyn botanical garden this past week, for several reasons not worth mentioning. Once with my camera once without.

Both days were gloomy - cold, loamy types of spring days. Been lots of talk around these parts about spring not springing this year. I snicker; this is my kind of spring. The kind of spring that takes the time to do it right. This is a cold spring that slowy unfurls and demands distinct attention HARK! the latency of nature's majesty revealed in languid tones. A metronome. A distant GONG! reverberating with the slow swelling we know so well from time lapse nature films. Something is happening.

70 degree days - STAY AWAY!

I figure it's time well taken, and there is a lesson in all this for me. I can learn to appreciate slow things, things that progress with pace. Another drizzly 50 degree day is another day we get to observe the phenomenon. Like doctors behind glass in an theatre, as city-dwellers we tend to observe spring with cannon's and macro lenses at the helm.

It pained me, but I left my camera home the second time around to the magnolia grove. I didn't want to miss seeing the spectacle with my own eyes. We tend to always want to capture nature. Bag it! Blog it! Make a souvenir of it, make it our own...

But a funny thing I've come to realize about nature is that you can't always take it with you.

hotter than a middle eastern climate..

2011-04-08T08:26:00.000-07:00

a little photo sesh i forgot about with these local hellebores that I have been obsessed with and yellow tights which make me look sort of jaundiced but i'm into them anyway

are you going to have a good weekend or what? we'll be working like slaves and loving every minute. happy birthday BANANA!!!

Thursday Update

2011-04-07T07:03:00.000-07:00

I have to run out the door to go pick up a few hundred lavender plants for a wedding this weekend, but wanted to let you in on some goings on around here...

1. Had dinner with Nicolette and the famed Emily Thompson last night. Amazing. I feel very happy and lucky this morning to have made a new friend. We talked and talked about flowers, the industry, clients, challenges, successes, money....

2. We have a new intern, Suset, who is killer, and whose enthusiasm is unmatched. She suggested she sleep overnight in the studio so she could get to work first thing in the morning. I really like her.

3. We have a ton of juicy spring material kicking around right now including single petaled white cherry, california poppies, gypsy hyacinth, local ranunculus, mums (i said it), fritillaria, etc and we'll be around through the weekend selling it if you want to come by.

4.. Free flower friday has got to be a pick-up this week, do you mind? We're a bit busy with a big wedding this Sunday and I want to keep everyone close to the studio. I throw in a bar of soap for you too...

Hope all is well out there with you and yours -

2011-04-06T08:36:00.000-07:00

[above a bridal bouquet from a few weeks ago with spiraea thunbergii, ranunculus, lilac, sweet peas, cherry blossoms, freesia, etc]

I'm just a big ball of hate this morning sugar heads, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that our new luxury suv driving neighbors are taking chain saws to every fucking tree in the back of our building. I started crying, thinking about all the birds that won't be able to find the trees they usually land in.

Eric, ever the moral compass of reason, said to me; "Sarah maybe they want to plant a vegetable garden and need the sunlight."

Then I'll set their fucking garden on fire! I said.

Haha kidding I didn't say that. I shut up about it and started emotionally eating blueberry muffins instead.

ruminant ramble

2011-04-04T19:01:00.001-07:00

Gouda-evening.

It's monday night. The night I have to myself - or as a friend recently put it - the night i tie scarves on my wrists and ankles and dance around to fleetwood mac. In reality; the night I snack on cheese all night and drink wine and try on all my jewelry at once and smoke a single cigarette...all alone.

Well, there it is.

I've been haunted this past week by Sweetgrass, a film by Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Ilisa Barbash about the last great american sheep drive through the highlands of Montana. Seen it? I can't stop thinking about it...

I listened to a podcast of Lucien talking about his experience trailing the herders for a summer in the mountains. He talked a bit about the giant pyrenees mountain dogs that live amidst the herd and will fight to the death when wolves or bears come around looking to eat a sheep. Curiously, in the movie you see the dogs one evening devouring something that looks a lot like a lamb...

Lucien explained that although the dogs are often starving (only so much kibble can be brought in to replenish the cowboy's supplies) they would never kill a sheep. But! as soon as a sheep is dead - they tear into it. Like white on rice. I find this so fascinating.

Also want to tell you the pyrenees mountain dogs are thick as bricks. Very different from the working collies that rally and round up the sheep.

Also also want to tell you that apparently sheep farming has been declining in the US for decades. Americans simply don't eat lamb and don't wear wool. (In fact last night Eric and I fashioned a pizza with lamb sausage, carmelized onions and ricotta. I would say it was the best pizza we have ever made. A welcome break from our mostly vegetarian regimen which is boring, but important to me. Sadly most lamb you find in groceries comes all the way from New Zealand, where sheep farming is part of the national identity.)

Also want to tell you that Lucien said that sheep farming is the one of the few industries that has not been vertically integrated into the modern farming system - that is to say that sheep can't be brought up in feed lots.

I really want to have a sheep farm someday. or next year.

2011-04-01T11:30:00.000-07:00

Hellebores, right?!?

Crazy fuckers just keep getting better - three varieties in this special arrangement delivered uptown today. Have a great weekend. I'll be blowing my nose and preparing our new series of classes over the the Little Flower School...

the end.

2011-03-31T05:37:00.001-07:00

**THE UNEMPLOYEED BROOKLYNITE - you won, but alas no email attached to your profile - email me right away and we'll get something pretty out to you this weekend, promise.

I've been burning the candle at both ends - as usual, and finally I pay the price; a spring head cold. Sadly now my employees know that I am not an invincible robot. good god, i'm HUMAN!

I am very sick. Have set up camp in bed with a bottle of vitamin C, a dirty dog, my computer, a glass of gingerale and box of puffs plus. The phone rings, I ignore it. Lost in researching sheep husbandry, or in perusing Ariella's new website. I barely finish some sorbet and throw the dish back at eric who has sweetly brought it to me. I'm DYING! I lost a nostril in the night!

Time to make clear my last wishes. The second time in my life I've made such a list, though none the less sincere - the first was at the age of 10 and included an itemized list of who should receive which compact disc..
i digress

Elyse: I leave my begonia collection, dear to my heart and thriving in its 3rd year. beware of the rex's - always they are near impossible to sustain - I think you'll find Angel Glow, and Red Fred two lovely new additions, and of course Snow Bound and Black Truffles; endless fun.

Aaron: I leave my jewelry collection, less the earrings, but with the clip-on's. I've sadly given up on you every piercing your ears and can't justify..

Jen: My books, which are a modest, dusty bunch - several of which are yours including a lovely navy clothbound Ginsberg anthology which I borrowed from you 10 years ago. And also my small tea set including the blue and gold pot - I loved the times when you'd show me how to brew the perfect pot of tea after your time in London, and we'd smoke cigarettes and listen to pj harvey

Eli: Naturally, my bakelite, my jadite, my vintage mixing bowls. For future use after the age of tunafish

Nicolette: That scalloped neck lyell top you've always wanted. and the earrings that aaron is not getting.

Jessica: The iitalla candle sticks, I don't think you ever got any from the family - and my seashells from vieques.

Josh: my records. remember you gave me King Crimson? a record that changed me somehow

Kim: my journals. i miss you.

Chris: my waterford glasses along with any gin left in the house

My mookie: Nea, and everything else...wow this is getting INDULGENT!

ONE LAST THING I HAVE TO GIVE AWAY! To you my dear reader! My last flower arrangement; which I will drag myself down to the studio now and lovingly make for you...comment to win it delivered to you tomorrow...

the kids are alright

2011-03-27T15:24:00.000-07:00

I worked up front in the shop today - first time in a long while. The girls and Eric took most of the day off, to watch basketball and rest up for a very nutty week ahead. It was nice to be alone and to ring people up for soaps...show off all my new begonias.

I guess I wasn't alone - I had Nea and Otis around, a very loud welcoming committee for anyone brave enough to open the door and come in.

Tomorrow we start a big installation of plants and flowers at the Anthropologie in Rockefeller center...I'm curious to see how it turns out and will snap some pictures to share...also we will be doing a pop-up shop there starting Wednesday, so all you mid-towners can visit Saipua without hauling yourselves to Brooklyn. You won't get to see the kids though...

September

2011-03-26T10:45:00.001-07:00

I wait all year for autumn. September is my favorite month because it means October is coming, and October is actually really my favorite month. Like most women, I like to think I'm complicated.

In Australia it's practically September now but strangely, they still call it April.

I digress -
What a delightful surprise to come across these pictures from a wedding we did last September at The New Leaf Cafe. Cosmos, Dahlias, Coxcomb, Chamomile...

[Cora - these are flowers you can use for your tea-tin arrangements at the end of August....]