Flowers from Baltimore’s own Hillen Homestead

Maya Kosok is the farmer behind Hillen Homestead.  Hillen Homestead is a vacant lot Maya adopted from the city to grow flowers, fruit and berries. This sweet little farm is less than 2 miles from LoCoFlo’s studio!

I first met Maya last winter in her role as founder of the Farm Alliance of Baltimore City. We got together to see if we could encourage urban farmers to grow flowers.  Since our meeting 6 months ago, LoCoFlo’s been fortunate to be able to buy flowers, herbs, veggies and wheat grass from several Farm Alliance members including Butterbee Farm, Whitelock Community Farm, and Boone Street Farm.

We’re excited to now be buying from Maya and Hillen Homestead as well. Our first purchase was for asclepias, ageratum and some gorgeous scabiosa. I used the scabiosa immediately as a perfect accent to some arrangements we provided for the Zoo last week.

One of our goals this year was to help develop  and buy from more Baltimore City flower growers.  We’re super excited to add Hillen Homestead to our family of growers!

VINE!

A couple weeks ago, Eric told us about VINE. When he described it, it sounded…less than interesting. A six second video that loops around and around indefinitely as you watch. WHY?

Then I started watching VINE videos. It’s amazing how effective a 6 second video can be in telling a story, making you laugh or showing you something incredible.

So, we signed up! On Friday, LoCoFlo started making VINE videos. We actually had a ton of fun making them.

Our first video showed Carling making a kale arrangement for Kale A Rama.

Our second video showed Irene making her version of the kale arrangements.

VINE is easy and fun – so check it out. Be sure to LIKE Local Color Flowers on VINE and check out our other videos!

Just Like I Imagined

For years, I imagined LoCoFlo having a home of it’s own where we could have plenty of fabulous space to work. I day dreamed about space to have consultations and pop-up markets and open houses and design classes.

Well, this weekend, it was just like I imagined. Friday, Carling, Irene, Laura Beth and I worked on a variety of fun projects including 2 weddings, arrangements for Kale A Rama, Lululemon, Apothecary Wellness and…the BGE guy (yes-the bge guy came to read the meter and ordered flowers to take home at the end of the day!).

(thanks to our friends at Balance Photography for photos of our kale arrangements!)

Saturday, we opened up the garage door while the Waverly Market was in full swing and sold herb and succulent gardens.

We also chit chatted with lots of friends and neighbors who stopped by to see what was inside “that green striped building”.

Finally today, we hosted our first design class in our new space! It was so much fun welcoming folks in to try their hand at floral design.

All of the arrangements turned out so beautifully! Here’s one example of a finished arrangement.

Spending the weekend working is pretty awesome when this is the kind of work you get to do!