Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Real Weddings: Amanda and Orion

When Eric and I were delivering the flowers for Amanda and Orion’s wedding, I told Eric I wished I was attending the wedding. It was a beautiful Friday evening in June, the Cloisters looked awesome with it’s gardens in full bloom and it just seemed like it was going to be a really beautiful, fun wedding.

Amanda looked amazing! Her dress was just gorgeous and I think the bouquet complimented it really beautifully. It was full of soft  pinks, corals, corals, yellows and greens. We used snapdragons, yarrow, lisianthus, eucalyptus and baptisia greens.

Bride The entry way was decorated with this great urn full of lisianthus, yarrow, phlox, snaps, dahlias and beautiful baptisia greens.

Centerpiece Thanks to our growers Belvedere Farm, Bridge Farm Nursery, Locust Point Flowers and Talmar.

Thanks to Signe Renn of Avenue Studios for these beautiful photos. 

Thanks to Marina (fab designer) and Eric (fab delivery helper) for helping me on this great wedding.

Bride and groom Congratulations to Amanda and Orion! Wishing you much love and happiness!

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Local Foodie Lucie Snodgrass Makes Us Hungry (and Proud!)

click to closeLast week some friends and I went to see Lucie Snodgrass at the main branch of the Enoch Pratt Library. I can’t lie, I have had a crush on Lucie Snodgrass for about 10 years. She used to write a column for the national magazine Vegetarian Times. My friends and I subscribed to the magazine and LOVED her column. It was funny, informative and always featured great stories about Maryland. One of my favorites was about a cherry pitter she found at a antique store…

Last year when I heard Lucie had a cookbook coming out that would feature seasonal, local cooking in Maryland I was beyond excited. I have to say, the book does not disappoint. Dishing Up Maryland: 150 Recipes from the Alleghenies to the Chesapeake Bay is a beautiful jewel of a book that everyone in Bmore and Maryland should own. Besides being full of great, wholesome recipes made with seasonal goodies from all over the state, it also tells amazing stories of the farmers and farm families that provide us with these fruits, veggies, baked goods and more. And the photographs, by Edwin Remsberg show off the unique beauty of Maryland.

Over falafel and hummus and wine after the talk, my friends and I poured over the book, making plans for a Maryland inspired dinner party as well as farm trips, vineyard trips and a Smith Island Cake baking date!

At the end of the night, I felt so grateful for good friends who share my love of Maryland and local food and farms and FLOWERS!  I also felt so proud to work with Maryland flower farmers everyday.  If you haven’t picked up a copy of Dishing Up Maryland…do it soon! You’ll definitely be inspired!

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Real Weddings: Alana and JP

Alana and JP were married in Baltimore on July 3, 2010. It was a beautiful day -not nearly has hot as the previous week when it was over 100 for several days straight. The ceremony took place at St. Vincent de Paul church in downtown Baltimore and the reception took place at the 1840’s ballroom across the street.

The bride carried a bouquet filled with white phlox, white lisianthus, blue hydrangeas and splash of mountain mint. She looked stunning with a teal ribbon hanging down against her dress.

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The girls carried vibrant bouquets filled with blue hydrangeas, purple lisianthus, purple salvia, pink dahlias, pink yarrow and green mountain mint.

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Thanks to all of our great growers! The flowers for this wedding were supplied by Belvedere Farm, Farmhouse Flowers, Locust Point Flowers and Talmar.

Special thanks to Weddings By Two who provided these beautiful photos! IMG_6712

R3-06Congratulations to Alana and JP! Wishing you many years of love and happiness! 

Friday, August 20, 2010

Real Weddings: Andrew and Alyssa

I have to say-I LOVED everything about this wedding! Alyssa and Andrew were such a great couple to work with. I met  Alyssa back in the winter when she was on a short break between trips. Alyssa is a professional musician for the US Army Field Band. She was super easy going, had a few ideas for colors and style for her flowers-but was happy to give us creative freedom to make something lovely.

The flowers in mid June were just beautiful. The bride’s bouquet was filled with dahlias, yarrow, gooseneck loosestrife, mountain mint, feverfew, campanula and a couple late blooming peonies.

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Gertrudes and the BMA were a perfect venue for the summer, garden wedding.  Working there is always a joy.

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As a vegetarian and lover of animals, I was especially excited about two special details of Andrew and Alyssa’s wedding. The first was a small card on each table that said: “In Celebration of our love of all creatures great and small, a donation in lieu of wedding favors has been made the Washington Animal Rescue League in honor of all the guests".”

IMG_0958 The second, was the opportunity to decorate a gorgeous vegan cake from my favorite vegan bakery Sticky Fingers! Kambor from Sticky Fingers and I decorated the cake with dahlias, mini sunflowers and some pretty yellow and pink yarrow. I think it turned out great!

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201006_EstelPysola-124_web Big thanks to one of my fave photographers Jocelyn Mathewes of Studio Mathewes for the beautiful photos!   Jocelyn is great at what she does, she is super creative and dedicated…and she is just so nice to work with!

All the flowers for this wedding came from Belvedere Farm, Locust Point Flowers and Talmar.  In case I haven’t mentioned it, our growers ROCK!

Thanks too to Jen and Marina-locoflo’s star designers and to Tiffany-for helping to deliver for the first time! She did a great job-and said she’ll definitely help again.201006_EstelPysola-387_web

And finally, congratulations to a truly wonderful couple. (I’m a little teary just thinking about them! ) Thank you for letting locoflo be part of your special day! 201006_EstelPysola-387_web

To see more photos from Andrew and Alyssa’s Wedding, check out our flickr page or Jocelyn’s blog.

Monday, August 16, 2010

August 15, 2010: A Sneak Peak at the Flowers

Three weddings in the last three days!  This weeks weddings were so much fun-so unique, so creative and so colorful!

Our first wedding of the weekend was Shelley and Bynum’s wedding at the Howard County Conservancy. Shelley wanted a super colorful, seasonal bouquet.  We filled Shelley’s bouquet with orange zinnias, dahlias and coxcomb, pink zinnias, dahlias and celosia, yellow zinnias, purple gomphrena and a little splash of mountain mint.

IMG_1287 Our second wedding of the weekend was Megan and Lee’s Baltimore themed wedding in Fells Point.  I LOVED her cake and cake topper!

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Our last wedding of the weekend was Annie and Josh’s wedding down in Arlington. Annie and Josh are a really wonderful couple who wanted their centerpieces to be full of local fruits and veggies that they were going to donate to the DC Food Bank at the end of the night. Over 120 pound of local fruits (from Reid Orchards) and veggies (from Breidenbaugh Farms) were used in these beautiful centerpieces.

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(a martini glass for the bride and groom’s sweetheart table with zebra tomatoes, gomphrena, white statice and salvia)

Thanks to all of our growers and suppliers this week including Belvedere Farm, Bridge Farm Nursery, Locust Point Flowers, Talmar, Reid’s Orchards and Breidenbaugh Farm.

Thanks to to all of the LoCoFlo designers, deliverers and helpers. LoCoFlo loves you!

Monday, August 9, 2010

August 7, 2010: A Sneak Peak at the Flowers

This was a big wedding weekend for LoCoFlo. We had two great weddings this past weekend.

Saturday morning’s wedding at the Pete Rawlings Conservatory at Druid Hill Park was such a great Baltimore Summer Wedding.  The bride was wearing a vintage Mexican  wedding dress and wanted flowers that would compliment that colorful embroidered flowers on her dress.

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We filled her bouquet with red zinnias, asclepias, coxcomb and gomphrena. We also included bright yellow zinnias, purple salvia, statice and gomphrena. Finally we added fragrant green mountain mint and rose scented geranium. 

IMG_1249 The bride provided her own vases including this beautiful purple glass vase and colorful Spanish bottle seen below.

IMG_1251It was just a beautiful vibrant wedding!  IMG_1257 Saturday evening’s wedding was also vibrant and lush and unique. Anna and Matt got married at the American Visionary Arts Museum. Anna wanted unique, modern and eclectic flowers in deep purple, orange and lime green.

IMG_1276 We made two different centerpieces for the tables. The first, a 5 inch by 5 inch cube was full of green hydrangea and green emerald tassels, orange zinnias, coxcomb, asclepias and gomphrena and deep purple buddleia and and gomphrena.

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The second set up tables had a similar cube (but a little smaller), a small little cube with an orange zinnia and a tall square vases with one single, beautiful gladiola.

IMG_1277 Thanks to everyone who helped out this weekend. All of LoCoFlo’s growers were great this week! I really did buy every orange flower within about 50 miles of Baltimore. All of this weekend’s flowers came from Belvedere Farm, Bridge Farm Nursery, Locust Point Flowers, Pahl’s Farm and Talmar. Thanks to our great LoCoFlo designers Jen and Marina and our delivery helpers Cathy (seen above working hard) and Eric!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Summer Beauty

Summer Arrangement

Someone ordered a single arrangement today to send to a friend. She said she wanted summer cut flowers-bright-and unique. The card read simply: Live the Life You Have Imagined-Henry David Thoreau. I loved it. It was a great  inspiration for me today. Were you inspired today?

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Way to Go California! Way to Go!

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Today, a judge in California overturned Prop 8, which banned same sex marriage in California. It’s about time!  The fight for gay marriage in California has been going on for years. It hit home for me back in the winter of 2004-which was better known as the “Winter of Love”.

My dear friend Susannah called me one night from the one of the coldest places on earth in the winter…Portland Maine. She and her long time girlfriend, the fabulous Bo Walker, had been living in Maine for a year while Bo went to boat building school. Susannah and I became friends when we worked together in San Francisco at TNDC. She told me that San Francisco’s mayor Gavin Newsome was going to allow same same sex marriage in the city for the first time starting in a few weeks. Everyone was so excited and nervous…because clearly Gavin Newsom was…breaking the law…sort of. Bo and Susannah, deprived of San Francisco’s good vibes for the past year, committed to the right of all couples to be able to marry if they want to and deeply in love with each other…decided they needed to be there. And they wanted me to be there. Things were tentative for a few days, because they weren’t sure if they could get a date/time at City Hall because it was a mob scene! Celebrities were getting married, politicians were getting married…long time gay rights activists and idealistic young couples were getting married. Everyone was trying to get in before the Attorney General put the kibosh on it! 

So Bo’s lovely aunt (a san Francisco judge) got them an appointment-one week from then-to get married at San Francisco’s City Hall. In one week,  everything came together-flights, a ceremony, outfits, flowers, brunch and a fab party back at their house. On a cool March day, surrounded by a half dozen or so family and friends, my dear friends Bo and Susannah got married. I don't have pictures (Susannah would-but she’s not on Facebook!) but I can tell you that in San Francisco’s historic City Hall, on that sunny, cool winter day, amidst the history making of that month, I have never felt more love or felt more proud to witness a wedding than I did that day.

Since then, there have been set backs for sure-annulment of the 4038 winter of love marriages being one of the worst. I sent Susannah a note today and said “If I lived in San Francisco, I would meet you after work for a cocktail to celebrate. Then we we go to Civic Center to  the rally to share the love with the rest of San Francisco  and we would finish the night off with burritos at Cancun. Perfect”.

I love and miss my friends dearly. Today is definitely a day to celebrate –love, friendship and equality for all.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Last Week of July: Sneak Peak at the Flowers

This past week was a great LoCoFlo week! It was so full of wonderful people and events. The week started with delivering flowers to the University of Maryland Baltimore for our second week of flower-selling there. Wednesday, I made half a dozen arrangements for a fundraising breakfast for GEDCO (love them!) and Thursday I provide several arrangements to Jordan Faye Contemporary for a reception honoring artist Kate Mackinnon.

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Kate’s work is so colorful and bold that Jordan wanted the flowers to be subtle. Inspired by this weekends weddings, we used white lilies, basil, mint, whit lisianthus and white statice. I especially loved these little 2x2 cubes for the cocktail tables.

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Saturday we had two beautiful weddings. The first was a morning wedding at Naylor Vineyard in Pennsylvania. The bouquets and centerpieces were made primarily with herbs and splashes of white and purple flowers. Perfect for the vineyard.

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On Saturday evening, we worked on a beautiful summer wedding at one of my favorite venues: Woodend Sanctuary. The bride wanted to have flowers in all shades of pink with a splash of green and lavender.  We used zinnias, lisianthus, dahlias crested celosia and phlox for the bouquets.

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We added bells of Ireland, mountain mint and and plume celosia for the ceremony arrangements.

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It was a really fun, challenging, creative week. Thanks to this weeks growers: Locust Point Flowers, Belvedere Farm, Bridge Farm Nursery and Talmar Gardens. Thanks too to Jen and Marina for such great design work-and Eric for driving all over PA and MD to help me deliver flowers. Looking forward to this coming week!