Saturday, April 28, 2012

Mother’s Day Rocks!

Only 2 weeks until Mother’s Day and LoCoFlo is excited to offer all sorts of goodies for special moms in your life.

Sending a beautiful, locally grown flower arrangement is a great gift for Mother’s Day. Local Color Flowers will head out to local flower farms and pick up May’s best blooms. With the weather being so weird this season…that could include some early season peonies! 

If you love local flowers and want to share them throughout the seasons, you can give the gift of a Flower Subscription. Subscription members will get flowers every season, every month or every week (your choice!)  This is a perfect way to enjoy the bounty that Maryland has to offer throughout the year!

If you really want to give a gift that keeps on giving…how about an herb garden or terrarium made with locally grown herbs and succulents?

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To find our more or to place an order, head over to our website and fill out an order form. Deliveries or pick ups available on Friday, May 11 or Saturday, May 12. Get your order in today!

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Saying Good-Bye to a Flower Farmer and Friend

I was saddened today to hear about the death of my farmer friend Mel Heath. Mel was a big part off why Local Color Flowers was so successful in our early years. Mel’s beautiful farm was located in Cockeysville. He was our closest grower for our first three years in business and we bought flowers from him almost every week. Mel was a meticulous grower. His farm was beautiful - without a weed in sight- and filled with some of the most beautiful flowers I’ve ever seen.

Mel was also a teacher. Before he “retired” and became a flower grower, he taught for 35 years throughout Baltimore. The teacher in Mel is what I valued most. He always took time to walk through the farm with me when I came to pick up flowers. He would tell me the botanical and latin names for everything he was growing. He explained (time and time again) why he couldn’t (or wouldn’t) sell me more of his prized peonies even though they looked beautiful on the plant. (Cutting peonies too early in the plants life will sap the energy out of them and make them grow back weaker each year).

Mel and I were  always in sync with our schedules. We both got up early and got to work early. Sometimes I would head out to the farm as early as 6am, just as the fog was starting to burn off and the sun was coming up. I loved seeing Mel and the flowers on these early Friday morning pick-ups.

One of my other fond memories of Mel was being invited out the farm a few winters ago to make wreaths and other creations out of Me'l’s barn full of dried flowers. Kathy York of Scarborough Farm and her aunt Sue, me and Mel, a few of his neighbors and Eric the farm manager spent a glorious day laughing, staying warm by the stove and being creative.

Mel decided to stop flower farming at the end of 2010. It was a big loss for Local Color Flowers and our clients. It was a big loss for me personally as well because Mel was moving to South Carolina to retire.  I was sad, but I also new he was moving with the woman he loved to place that he loved and would be happy.

LoCoFlo really is not just a job…or just a business. It is really a community of folks…growers, designers, clients, friends and more that love flowers, and love the earth…and I dare say….love each other.  I’m grateful for having known Mel Heath.

Celebrating Same Sex Marriage at the LGBT Wedding Expo This Sunday at the Hippo!

Local Color Flowers is excited to be part of the upcoming Marry Me In Maryland LGBT Expo this Sunday! It’s been a long road to getting Same Sex Marriage legalized…now it’s time to start planning your wedding!

The Expo is taking place at Club Hippo located 1 West Eager Street in Baltimore from 1-5. Load of vendors will be on hand to help with wedding planning A-Z.

Come out and visit Local Color Flowers booth! We’re excited to meet everyone!

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Local Color Flowers WINS the Awesomest Booth Contest at borrowed!

So…in case you missed it…Local Color Flowers was part of a super great, creative wedding show extravaganza on April 1. Not only did we have a ton of fun meeting so many great people, we WON the Awesomest Booth Contest.

"We're so delighted to announce that the attendees at borrowed on April 1st have chosen Local Color Flowers as the winner of the Awesomest Booth Contest! As the winner, Local Color Flowers will receive a free booth at the next borrowed event of their choice. Ellen & her team put together a stunning, cohesive display that was true to their brand, featuring their new birch pole chuppah and a variety of local, seasonal blooms."

-Natalie Fava, organizer of borrowed

Unlike other shows, where the planners give you a table, chairs and pipe and drape dividers, the folks at borrowed gave us…nothing…except a taped off spot on the floor.  The idea was to make the space a creative and unique as possible. (oh yeah…and we won!)

Carling and Jen and I have a great planning meeting a few weeks before the event. Our only jumping off points were “something that looked like a barn/farm” and Eric’s idea of having “I Do” statements.

Since our space was really small, we decided to set up our new, improved, birch pole chuppah and decorate it with flowers and antiquey signs. We didn’t really have room for a standard table so we made a custom table that would have holes in it for our chuppah poles. Carling made the antique signs which looked great and were an easy, visual way to tell people who we were.

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Once we had all the pieces, Eric and I did a dry run of everything. We loved it!

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Our final display was filled with beautiful local flowers, flowering branches, herbs, succulents and more. We hung most of the arrangements because of the limited space…it looked (and smelled) awesome!

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Thanks to everyone who helped make our booth so fabulous including all the growers and the LoCoFlo team!

Friday, April 6, 2012

Real Weddings: Rachel and Daniel

Our first wedding of the season took place on March 18th at the Howard County Conservancy. Who would have guessed that Rachel and Daniel would have such an unseasonable warm, beautiful day on which to get married?

The bride and her bridesmaids carried bouquets filled with tulips, ranunculus and snapdragons. Green splashes of eucalyptus and rosemary added to the natural, rustic feel.

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The barn at the Conservancy was beautiful for the couple’s ceremony.

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For the reception, the couple collected an eclectic mix of milk bottles and mason jars and we filled them with Spring blooms including tulips, ranunculus, daffodils, iris and forsythia.

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Thanks to Farmhouse Flowers and Plantmasters for these early season beauties!

Special thanks to Sarah Culver Photography for these beautiful photos! To see more from photos Rachel and Daniel’s Wedding check out our flickr site and Sarah Culver’s blog.

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Congratulations to Rachel and Daniel! Thank you for your commitment to buying local for your wedding. Wishing you much joy and happiness in the future!

Thursday, April 5, 2012

February’s “You Deserve A Bouquet Today” Winner: Ms. Juanita

Ms. Juanita wasn’t prepared to have her picture taken when she received her flowers today.

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She was busy getting her ailing husband, Mr. Harold, ready for the doctor. Even though you don’t have a picture of her, you can get a sense of her from what her neighbor Tiffany wrote about her for her nomination:

Ms. Juanita is the block leader and overall neighborhood advocate of our community. She ensures kids in the community have school supplies, participate in summer camp and other resources. Currently she is caring for her ailing husband. Ms. Juanita is simply a generous soul who never complains.

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I might add my own impression of Ms. Juanita. When I arrived at Ms. Juanita’s home in Reservoir Hill, she graciously invited me in and excitedly hugged me and excepted her gift. She told me, and Mr. Harold conferred, that when she woke up that morning she said that it was going to be a good day. She was touched that her neighbor and friend nominated her for the contest.

After thanking me profusely, Ms. Juanita walked me to the door and told me that God puts people in our lives at the right time for a reason. She let me know that she had a sick friend that she wanted to send flowers to but wasn’t sure who to call about it. She hoped that she could call me and I could deliver flowers to her friend.

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This is exactly why Ms. Juanita won this month’s bouquet. Even as we were trying to celebrate her, and her contribution to Reservoir Hill, she was thinking of someone that she could help-someone that would be cheered with a bouquet of flowers.

Thank you Ms. Juanita for all you do to make people’s lives more joyful. We celebrate you today!

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Creative Couples at AVAM for borrowed!

On Sunday, the LoCoFlo team set up a ridiculously fabulous booth at borrowed: A wedding show for the creative I DO. Playing off the theme, Carling (our super talented new designer) made these beautiful signs that showcase some of our own I DO’s!

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We also debuted our new birch pole chuppah. It was so beautiful! We covered it with local red bud from plant masters and hung all sorts of different flower filled “vessels” from the rafters. (The chuppah is now available for rental-so let us know if you’re interested!)

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I think our new Local Color Flowers sign was one the highlights! Carling did a great job making an “antiqued” version of our logo. It fit perfectly with the overall presentation.  Thanks to Sarah Park for the beautiful photos of our booth!

301755_509574597587_132600146_30207901_1615509254_nOf course, having several photos booths in close proximity to our booth was fun too!

Ok, so enough about US! We were excited to me some amazing couples that were excited about meeting with.  We also loved seeing some of our great friends including Sara and Jill of Jill Andrews Gowns and Lindsay, Shane and Jonathon of Readyluck. Finally, we were really grateful to meet some new friends including the guys at Hi-Society Productions, and Mary Alice from Charm City Cakes.

It was great to see so many creative folks in one place-thinking about how to think outside of the box for their wedding or event. Thanks to everyone who came and visited our booth!

Special thanks to our fabulous team (including Eric and Christian) for making the show a huge success! 

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