I work at a very old-fashioned flower shop. They have computers, but only use them with the proprietary FTD and Teleflora software. No internet. This is a big problem because a lot of orders come from their website.
Here's how it works: A customer goes to the website and looks through the photos of arrangements provided to every FTD or Teleflora member shop and orders an arrangement. The order comes to me as TFWEB-523 for Teleflora or B3-4169 for FTD. (I just made those numbers up, but there is an actual arrangement on the Teleflora website with that number.) Instead of pulling up the photo on one of the 5 computers in the shop, I search through a stack of workbooks to find out what the arrangement looks like. Sometimes I pull it up on my phone, but I always have to look it up. That's how it works.
The photo above is an arrangement I made today, not a copy of an FTD or Teleflora arrangement. It has lavender Stock (smells good), purple Tulips, lavender Daisy Poms, purple Monte Cassino, pink Waxflower (also smells good), and Springerii (the greenery). The order was for a lush European style arrangement.
Another way the shop is old-fashioned is that they do not carry a wide variety of flowers. It's strictly the basics, which is not very inspiring. The owners have a preference for Carnations, Daisies, Gerbera Daisies, Gladiola, Statice, Babies Breath (GAG!), Roses, and Lilies. They throw in a few bunches of Tulips, Alstromeria, Stock, Snapdragons, Waxflower, Misty Limonium, Bells of Ireland, Delphinium, Sunflowers, and Hydrangea and that's about it. It may sound like a lot of different flowers to someone who is not a florist, but trust me when I say it's not.
The selection of greenery is also limited. I'll spare the break down, but we have about 6 different varieties for a few days, then it's back to Leather Leaf fern and Wide Leaf Emerald (which they call "funeral greens"). For funeral sprays, their preference is an oval shape with mostly Carnations, a big bow in the center (really big) and a bow on each of the legs of the easel.
I made a beautiful spray when I first started (not the one in the picture), I think I had been there less than a week and the order was about $150. It was for a man, so I used all primary colors (red, blue, and yellow). It had a cluster of red Gladioli at the top, slightly to the left. The middle had sunflowers in a diagonal line across the center from the right, down to the left. The lower section had Belladonna Delphinium echoing the line of the Gladioli. I used Springerii to create a cascading effect just below the Sunflowers and also wove it through them to give the illusion of depth and texture. Just between the Gladioli and the Sunflowers I cut the Wide Leaf to make little loops and stacked them along the line above the Sunflowers. It sort of made me think of a river running through a landscape and balanced the Springerii cascade on the other side. (
These loops are sometimes used to make faux Roses - if you can imagine a greenery sculpture that looks like a flower, that's what it is). Again, this technique created depth and texture. I wish I had taken a picture, but I didn't know the owner would freak out the way she did.
As I said, I had just started working there. I am a Master Florist and not only studied art in college, but have also taken advanced floral design classes from some of the best designers in the country. Working with leaves, plaiting, weaving, and sculpting are techniques I learned from
Phil Ruilloda, not from his book or video, from him. In person. The techniques I used in this spray are the type of design you would see in a magazine.
I finished the spray, put the ticket in the delivery box and started on the next order. A few minutes later the driver had it loaded and was ready to leave. The owner of the shop came over and asked if I had put a bow on the spray. I said, "No, it doesn't need one".
She got visibly upset, grabbed a pre-made bow, rushed outside, pulled the spray out of the van, and tried to find a place to put the bow. I almost started crying. I had just created a sympathy tribute that I would be proud to exhibit at an event filled with professional floral designers and she wanted to put a smashed up, dusty bow on it. I was devastated. I tried to calm down and continued making the arrangements on my stack of tickets.
About 2 hours later the driver returned. I pulled her aside and said, "Please tell me you took that bow off before you took delivered it".
She laughed and said, "She didn't put it on. She couldn't find a place for it". I was relieved, but also saddened that high quality design and creativity were not going to be appreciated at this shop.
That was almost 3 months ago and I usually do the type of boring generic arrangements that take skill, but absolutely no talent to make. I am no longer the boss in my own shop, just an employee paid to make what these people want made. I get so frustrated, though, that every few days I make something I like. I call it "going rogue". The same driver referenced above calls it "getting fancy" because this is her first job in a flower shop and before I started, the boring stuff was all she had ever seen.
My hope is that the economy will start to turn around so I can find investors to help me open my next flower/chocolate shop so I can create the type of designs that are impressive, not just because you received flowers, but that are truly well put together. I'm sure there will be many posts on why I hate this job, but I also hope there is some humor in the absurdity of it all. I actually laugh now when I think of her running outside with the bow.
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This was also from Tuesday, for a woman starting a new job. Her mother ordered a basket arrangement, so I decided to use a flat one without handles that she could use for something else when the flowers are gone.
I made two arrangements this week that I liked. Both were for funerals, although the style and color scheme would be appropriate for a wedding as well.
It should come as no surprise that the shop where I work ordered some green dyed Carnations for St. Patrick's Day. That's some of them on the right. These were dyed by putting green dye into a bucket, cutting the bottom of white Carnation stems and placing them into the dye. It is absorbed up through the stem where it leaves pigment deposits. You can't really see it, but these almost looked like lace doilies the way the dye was absorbed. Whether this was food coloring or specially made for flowers I don't know since I didn't do the dying.
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Tulips, Gerbera Daisies, Irises, and a Lily in a tempered and glazed terra cotta cube. There's also white Stock on the back that's easier to see in the view from the top. There are 2 stems of Springerii to soften the focus. The framework is a quarter stem of Curly Willow bent into a knot, echoed above the water line by a single branch tied into a small knot. Another example of a design my bosses hate.
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I like the picture quality of the camera on my Blackberry. This is a very nice photo of 20 Dendrobian Orchids, Curly Willow, and 3 Gardenias in a tall hand blown glass rectangle vase. The customer (in New York) requested a photo of their order. I originally stood one of the black foam mats that we stand on against the counter as a backdrop. It fell over and landed on the arrangement, knocking it over and breaking the tips off 3 of the Orchids. My boss (who HATED this arrangement) was shocked when that was the only damage.
