Art in Bloom 2014

Nature's Bones

We’ve said before that floral design is an art and recently we once again had the opportunity to pair our flowery art with its more traditional counterpart, paintings and mixed media designs at the Cheltenham Center of the Arts’ second annual Art in Bloom, Floral Interpretations of Paintings.

For this year’s April 26^th event five talented Stein Your Florist Co. designers, as well as several more of the Philadelphia area’s floral artists exhibited their floriated interpretations of a variety of masterfully created paintings and mixed media art pieces at the CCA’s exhibit.

Stein Your Florist Co. owner/operator and designer Patrick Kelly chose to interpret “Nature’s Bones” by Paul Gorka. He created the floral portion of his design with blue delphinium, dendrobium orchids, Spanish moss and pothos. His design used a lot of mixed medias, awarding him Best in Show for mixed media design. The drift wood at the base was from his own backyard as well as the tall pussy willow branches. The tree branches and small pinecones were gathered from the grounds around the art center, the stones were from the pond in our flower shop, the large pinecones were from a trip to Yosemite State Park and the resin skull was a local flea market find. Patrick had a wonderful time creating his piece and said that the painting was the first one to catch his eye upon entering the art center.

Untitled 1

Stein Your Florist Co. designer George Emberger chose to interpret “Untitled 1” by Edwina Brennan. He said he was drawn to the pops of natural color and wispy freedom juxtaposed to the linear grid work in the design. George constructed his own three-dimensional grid of river cane with floral bursts of color in roses, tulips, pincushion protea, solidego, Spanish moss, ferns, seeded eucalyptus, and sprays of bear grass.

Road of the Flower

George also hosted a behind the scenes seminar before the main Art in Bloom exhibit. He did a live interpretation of “Road of the Flower” by Merle Spandorfer, designing for an audience, answering questions, and describing his interpretive process while he created his art piece. He chose a bold black container and curvaceous black branches to make the “road” of the painting pop in his design. The painting’s colors were picked up in the flowers George used:  ginger, gerbera daisies, alstroemeria, chrysanthemums, leptospermum, and springeri. The painting’s creator was there for the live demonstration and was fascinated by George’s interpretation and design process.

Living Room - Fort Lauderdale 1995

Co-operations manager of our Burlington, NJ location and designer Jessica Kelly chose to interpret “Living Room – Fort Lauderdale 1995” by Howard Silberthau. She was drawn to this painting’s deceptive simplicity, appearing as a blank canvas from afar but boasting wonderful detail and linear precision up close. Jessica chose to interpret the painting as an unfinished canvas, paying homage to the evening’s theme and created her floral design as an unfinished painting itself. Working with liatris, roses, lilies, hydrangea, cymbidium orchids, gladiolus, iris, larkspur, bells of Ireland, and peacock feathers (a signature piece in many of Jessica’s designs) she created a massive arrangement to compliment the painting’s equally massive size. Some of the arrangement’s flowers were hand painted to convey the idea of a work in progress and it was accented with brushes, a painter’s palette, a paint splattered drop cloth and other painter’s tools to finish the effect. Jessica’s design was awarded Most Creative Floral Interpretation of a Painting.

Under the Microscope

Co-operations manager of our Burlington, NJ location, head of social media and designer Jennifer Kelly chose to interpret “Under the Microscope” by Barbara Straussberg. Jennifer, who has a bachelor’s degree in bioscience and biotechnology from Drexel University, said that “this painting reminded [her] of [her] college days in the lab, staring into a microscope at the various minute wonders of a world we rarely get to see.” Playing on the “under the microscope” theme Jennifer created her design as three oversized microscope slides, complete with labels and floral specimens. The “Succulent Plantae Sp.” slide was designed with live succulent plants, fresh cut pin cushion protea, and accented with Spanish and reindeer moss and dried foliage. The “Amaryllis Hippeastrum, c.s.” slide was made with roses, pincushion protea, hyacinth blooms wired as though floral flagellum, eucalyptus, hypericum berries, tulips, cut succulents, reindeer moss, floral pods, and a cross-section of an amaryllis bulb. Finally, the “Punica Granatum, c.s.” slide was created with tulips, amaryllis, roses, pincushion protea, cut succulents, ranunculus, reindeer moss, loops of hypericum berries, Brussel sprouts, savoy cabbage, purple cabbage, and a cross-section of a pomegranate. Jennifer had the opportunity to meet the painting’s creator and she was blown away by her floral interpretation. Jennifer was awarded Best in Show for Fun and Fantastic Design.

Ruby and Friends

Our final representation from Stein Your Florist Co. was created by freelance designer Denise Emberger, who chose to interpret “Ruby and Friends” by Gillian Bedford. Loving the beach, Denise focused not on the children in the painting, but on their surroundings. She stacked bubble bowls, mimicking the frothy waves of the ocean, atop a piece of driftwood and filled them with seashells, starfish and mosses resembling kelp and other sea life. She completed her design with beautiful green cymbidium orchids, pincushion protea and a large spray of bear grass that looked as though it was plucked from the sand dunes.

Our designers have been invited back to participate in the CCA’s event once again next spring. Two weeks prior we will draw for spots to select from the art on display and plan our designs. We are looking forward to another inspirational affair and we hope you will join us.

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Stein Your Florist Co. designer Jennifer Kelly adding the
finishing touches to her flora interpretation of  Under the Microscope