Creating Elegant Bud Vases With The Last Of The Garden Flowers

9 Oct

As the season starts to turn into late autumn, the garden begins its gentle fade. Although the flowers are no longer in abundance, there are still plenty of treasures to be found. Now is the time that foliages and dried florals take the lead, and I like to play with structure and form when creating arrangements for the house.

My approach with house arrangements this time year (when working with garden grown materials), is to create a series of small but impactful designs in bud vases, which I then cluster together.

Firstly, I create some structure and shape with the foliages. I prefer asymmetrical designs as they are more natural. One of the ways to create naturalism in floral design, is to work with the characteristics of each stem to determine their best placement. Having a lower gestural flourish on the right side, which is then balanced by a taller, more upright flourish to the left, is a favoured approach of mine.

I then place any focal flowers (in this instance, Cosmos), at varying heights. Finally I add the grasses and other accent stems, like seedheads. I like both glass and ceramic vessels, and I am always on the lookout for interesting pieces. Having a wide selection of bud vases at your disposal means you can create something beautiful however meagre the harvest.