blissful blues

I love the iridescent glow in the blues (and merging into purples here).  Blue, the color of quiet; still or crashing waves.  I come to water for calm, for reflection, for peace. 

The sweetest little powder blue forget-me-nots that pop up along my fence.

Floral on floral, I remember playing with scraps from my grandmother's vintage Liberty of London fabric stash when I was little.  One of my favorites was one of their iconic florals in blues and greens similar to this one.  

Looking for more color?  A post about summer color and rainbows.

All flowers, styling and photography by Silvanie Farmar Bowers

Easter eggs

Last year, I was all about bare eggs. Spring is a time of color and these Kashmir eggs are all about that.  

A few chocolates go a long way in this simple little basket of baby tears with a few different springs of flowers tucked in.  Perfect for a toddler or on your table.

I almost like the messy bits behind-the-scenes more.  I always seem to take photos of them.

More Easter and egg cups from last year.

All florals, styling and photography by Silvanie Farmar Bowers

fairy bouquets

Spring has finally arrived!  Happy to let go of winter and move on to days getting warmer.  I am forever in love with strawberries and anyone who knows me knows I love using the foliage and flowers in arrangements.  Such fond memories from my childhood of walking through our garden, picking strawberries.  We used to pick the berries for our dessert and my mom would whip the cream, sometimes even vanilla ice cream.  I guess its the true sweetness of childhood?  My mom talked to us a lot about different fairies living in the plants and wild strawberries (or in the garden) have always seemed so magical to me and a sweet place for a fairy to live.

How could they not want to live with daisies and strawberries?

Daisies are another favorite - their sweet faces pull me in.  When I was a kid, I used to love making fairy bouquets mostly out of tiny weeds, pinched between my fingers, almost small enough to put in a thimble.  In keeping with that magic, I made my son a fairy bouquet with strawberry flowers and foliage, flowering thyme complete with a butterfly and mushroom, tied with a fine wool string with a little bow and long tails.   Pure magic!

 I think I could just make fairy bouquets all day.

week 8

Bringing the spring colors inside on these cold days.  Painting, mixing colors, everything childhood should be.  

This Bjørn Wiinblad vase makes me so happy, she has flowers coming out everywhere, just my kind of woman. 

violets

An explosion of scent and color, violets are such a sweet treat.  

They are hardy in the garden but a fleeting cut flower.  Expect a couple of days of life in water.     

Such sweetness from a little handful of flowers.  

A look at last year's violets.

f l o r a l c o l o r

Watercolor experiments with florals

roses & strawberries

You can feel spring in the morning now, with light pouring through the windows and the warmth outside. Suddenly, you don't need your sweater.  My sister, Zoe and I got together to make a sweet post about May Day, but then were more inspired by an abandoned birds nest and roses.  Roses growing on her fences and field.  She and I grew up on our family's cut flower farm with 13,000 roses planted in our fields and worked together designing florals for years.  We have always done flowers.

In Asia, roses in fossils have dated back 70 million years.   Even if they don't know any other flowers, most people can identify a rose.  Throughout history, symbolism of roses has meant so many things, from love to death, peace to war.  Wreaths of roses have been found in Egyptian tombs, and Romans used them to carpet their floors for special occasions.  

Roses and strawberries are such a sweet combination, with this single-petaled climber mimicking a strawberry flower.  It is also a beautiful scent combination and can be used to create delicious jams.  They go together so easily.

I spent the summer I turned twenty in France and one of my favorite desserts was a bowl full of sliced strawberries with red wine and sugar to macerate them.  Just soak them in the wine.  No need for cream or anything else.  Delicious. 

Rose water is so refreshing, a quick face or body mist with a hydrosol really helps cool you down and to elevate your senses.  It's also nice to spritz it over a glass of chilled white wine or champagne.

See another easy bouquet Zoe and I did with strawberries.  Or, some of her garden roses.  Daisies and strawberry foliage is also another nice combination. 

Florals and styling by Zoe Honscher & Silvanie Farmar Bowers, photos by Silvanie Farmar Bowers

Tin Can Arrangements

Making arrangements in tin cans has become one of my favorite things.  It's a nice way to recycle, and makes an easy gift of your garden flowers.   I make weekly arrangements for my son's preschool class. Using tomato cans is economical, recyclable, and non-breakable if they get knocked over in the classroom. I save the cans that come though my kitchen, I love tomato cans, with or without the label, vintage or new. I also keep my eye out for them (water tight is a must though) at garage sales and thrift stores.

Some more tin can arrangements from last summer.  I favored the cans sans label.  They look great on a kitchen table, or if you're dining al fresco, you don't have to worry about bringing them back inside or the wind blowing them over and breaking a favorite vase.

Easy Bouquet

An easy bouquet or, more like a posy with fresh cut strawberries my sister, Zoe and I did in her garden. This would make the sweetest and simplest bridal bouquet.  Not too fussy, and full of spring.

Zoe leaning on her fence covered in hops.  Below a little video of her putting the bouquet on the fence and making some finishing touches.  She is an amazing designer.  

Sweetest little thing.  It has strawberries in it, so I have to twirl it!

Flowers should be fun and express the seasons as well as you.  Relax.  

Flowers by Zoe Honscher & Silvanie Farmar Bowers, photos by Silvanie

More spring flowers and Easter things too...

Little garden bits in some French egg cups.  We lugged these egg cups across France along with antiques (mostly enamelware) for my mom on a family trip when I was a teenager.  Somehow, they've ended up in my cupboard. 

I talked before about using what you have in the garden, even dandelions.  Simple really is prettiest and easy to do.

I love these bare, speckled eggs now.  But, we'll dye and decorate eggs when it gets close to Easter.  It's a very magical time for those who believe in the Easter bunny.  

All florals, styling and photography by Silvanie Farmar Bowers  

Easter Eggs

More non-dyed, bare, in the buff eggs.  I love the soft, natural colors of the eggs themselves with bright spring flowers.  

I always love the mix of colors during spring, and a little can go a long way.  This is only two stems of lilac, a few crabapple branches, a few freesia, a handful of forget-me-not stems and a few snips of viola and maiden hair fern from pots on my front porch.  Most people have more things to cut outside than they think.  Mix it up, even pulling up a dandelion or two and putting them in a small bowl or terra-cotta pot with some eggs around is sweet.  

Time to clean up...

All flowers, styling and photography by Silvanie Farmar Bowers.

p e t a l s

Soft crabapple petals.

Bare Eggs

These eggs are about as simple as it gets.  I had grand ideas about using the viola I pressed in the antique colors I've been obsessing over the last few weeks.  But, after getting dozens and dozens of fresh eggs from my sister's chickens, I decided I wanted to look at the bare eggs.  All of the eggshell variations are so beautiful just the way they are.  Soft, buff, speckled, green and brown.

All flowers, styling and photography by Silvanie Farmar Bowers

Flower Friends, Spring Part Four

More spring flowers for the table with Laura and Brooke.  

All flowers and styling by Laura Miller, Brooke Harrington and myself, Silvanie Farmar Bowers.  

Flower Friends, Spring Part Three

Another in this series of spring florals done by Brooke Harrington, Laura Miller and myself.  All working in floral design, we love to do floral things when we get together.  Last week, we spent a few hours in Laura's beautiful garden in Oakland making vignettes using mostly flowers from our own gardens.

Cheers!

Flower Friends, Spring Part Two

Another spring vignette from our day of floral styling in Laura's beautiful garden.   Brooke brought some fava beans and fresh eggs from her hens to share.  

All flowers and styling by Laura Miller, Brooke Harrington and Silvanie Farmar Bowers.  All photos by Silvanie Farmar Bowers.

Flower Friends, Spring Part One

I love to get together with my flower friends and have some fun.  Earlier this week, Brooke Harrington and I met up at Laura Miller's sweet house in Oakland.  You may remember Laura's house and studio visit I did last spring (here).  The three of us styled a few little vignettes in her beautiful garden.  All of the flowers we used were gathered by us from our gardens.  

Laura working on her tool alcove and potting bench.

We borrowed some of my mom's enamelware.

Laura beautifying!

All flowers and styling by Laura Miller, Brooke Harrington and Silvanie Farmar Bowers.  All photos by Silvanie Farmar Bowers.

Check out my visit to Brooke's garden and floral design studio.  Thanks to my mom, Lisbeth for enamelware and roses.  You can see a visit to her sweet house.