As you develop your designs skills, it is important to grow your knowledge of the plant materials you are using at the same time. You may find that you enjoy working with certain varieties more than others – my preference these days is for Australian native flora as I find its variety and colours lend themselves to my preferred design styles.
This was a “getting to know you” design, loosely based on an horizontal style. Australian native plant material does not enjoy being in floral foam as most of the stems are on the woody side so water does not travel well from the foam to the stem. This design is set on a long shallow tray filled with water so the stems that need water can be placed directly in it.
Using three cuts of gymea lily (Dorianthes excelsor) in a triangle shape provides a small gap either side of the top cut for placement of stems into the tray below.
In this design I am looking at matching the colours of the gymea with stems of the ti tree (small pink flowers) and bottlebrush (longer side placements). Then I can also match the green of the woolly bush with the open kangaroo paw flower so I get the combination/repetition of two colours in the design – pink and green.
The varied pink of the grevillea (centre placements) brings together all the other pink variations whilst also repeating the form of the bottlebrush and gymea.
I must stress this is not an example of an horizontal design in the formal sense as the placements are not all horizontal. It would work for a design title “Long and Low”, for a long table centre or for “Tints, Tones and Shades”.
