Last month I took a class with Charissa Brock, who is a brilliant bamboo artist. How fortunate am I that she lives in Portland! Her spacious studio is filled with stunning designs and lots of tools. I was interested to learn how to design a headpiece, using a bamboo structure. She shared many techniques and I quickly found out how very time consuming working with bamboo is. But the results are so worth the patience and the effort!

Last week I taught a workshop in Bend, at the lovely shop Flowers by Eryn. The PNW Florist Association had organized this well attended event in Central Oregon. The 3 hr drive was simply stunning. It is fascinating to witness the major change in landscape that morphs from a rich, evergreen forest on Mt Hood to plateaus of arid grasses with very few trees.

In the morning students created woodland wreaths and in the afternoon fabulous woodland botanical headpieces were designed. Many thanks to all the attendees and to Eryn and Michelle for organizing a great workshop!

photo Theresa Bear

Work one-on-one with Françoise in her private Portland Studio!

Focus on what you wish to study most, whether it be challenging mechanics, uncommon materials, or floral business logistics.

This mentorship model is ideal for fitting Françoise’s invaluable instruction into your available time and for tailoring the lessons to your specific needs and interests. Françoise’s open and flexible approach perfectly lends itself to a deep exploration of floristry. The Private Workshop is ideal for florists just launching their businesses or for inspiring new directions and fresh ideas in seasoned designers.

My friend Paige organized a fabulous event at Dancing Oaks Nursery in Monmouth last weekend. She had suggested to Amy at the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon to organize a field trip to Dancing Oaks:. 50 members enjoyed a private tour of the gardens and nursery by Fred, one of the owners, and his niece Shelly. Afterwards, I gave a demonstration on how to make a variety of woodland designs. The guests were also treated to wonderful food prepared by Cindy and baked goods from Baker and Spice.

Botanical Couture Workshop
October 19th & 20th

Woodland Workshop
November 9th & 10th

The locally grown amaranthus is simply magnificent at this time of the year. Vibrant Valley Farm grows a plethora of the most stunning varieties in quite the selection of colors. Some of the flowers are 2-3′ long! I bought a couple of bunches to make headpieces for a photo shoot.

The first one was designed with 2 halves of Holly Chapple pillows secured to a headband. It was decorated with amaranthus, mini phalaenopsis and a plethora of textured. For the second one, a gnarly grapevine branch was perfect to drape many long stems of amaranthus; several varieties of foliage, seedpods and other textures embellished the headpiece. The mask was covered with hydrangea petals from the garden.

Many thanks to Christopher Ber for modeling and Sheryl Tynes for the photography.

VVF is one of the numerous flower and veggie farms located on Sauvies Island at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers just 10 miles NW from downtown Portland.

We spent an enchanting afternoon and evening in a delightful garden, where we all reveled in nature’s offerings, including beautiful flowers, plants and delicious food. After demonstrating how to create a woodland/floral-themed table-scape, attendees created their own table-scape to join the collective creations on the table.

Many thanks to @rootsofjoybotanicals for hosting this woodland workshop and magnificent dinner in her gorgeous garden on Saturday! What a memorable experience!
It could not have been a more beautiful and inspiring setting for students to design great centerpieces that later decorated the dinner table.

The grilled fish and vegetables were delicious, the dessert was superb – the best ice cream I have ever eaten! Thank you chef @chris_dishes for preparing such a special meal!

Everyone received a copy of my new book, “Wonder of the Woodlands”.

A couple of years ago I started to decorate plain gift boxes with botanicals from the garden or the cooler. My friends loved it! Sometimes I decorate a box, either with blossoms and some textures, or I create a woodland scape. Sometimes I simply decorate tissue paper.

This botanical fascinator was fashioned with 2 half pillows from @syndicatesales that were secured to a headband.
The back of each was covered with torn pieces of cork. The front of one was covered with foliage of cotinus and a couple of stems of ripsalis; the other one was covered with seedpods of lunaria and decorated with green blueberries, alchimella, blossoms of digitalis, baptisia, cerinthe, dogwood, pansies, allium bulgaricum and christophii, seedpods of mahonia,…
Photos @ted.mishima
Model @alexistrilliams

A few weeks ago a few friends and I got together to build fairy houses in the studio. We picked pieces of bark, branches, moss and lichen covered wood etc and created the sweetest fairy houses; The following week we took them to a woodland setting on the property of my friend Linda where Saskia took fabulous pictures. I cannot wait to see hers. In the meantime I decided to post the ones I took with my Iphone.