Françoise has given presentations at garden clubs, design conferences and museums. She enjoys the opportunity to visit these esteemed programs and venues across the country and to contribute her knowledge and viewpoint through demonstrations and discussions.
Woodland and Botanical Haute Couture are the most requested presentations. Françoise creates a detailed series of botanical mock-ups that show the mechanics, stages and steps involved in creating her signature pieces. Jewelry, headpieces and floral fabric are modeled to further demonstrate her pieces in action. There is time for extensive questions and answers throughout her presentations and follow-up workshops are often scheduled as part of her conference appearance. Head on over to the Portfolio and Blog pages to view the work that has been created in past presentations.
Rhode Island Federation of Garden Clubs recently had the pleasure of hosting a special design event featuring Françoise Weeks and her Woodland and Botanical Haute Couture presentation. With an international reputation and unique style in contemporary floral artistry we knew she would be a popular speaker that would attract a large audience.
What was unexpected was how exceptionally generous Françoise is with her time and talent. She answers all questions and makes herself approachable to novice and experienced designers alike. She discussed her techniques while supplementing the demonstration with a PowerPoint presentation showing the breadth and adaptability of her design repertoire. She truly gave us a fresh perspective on nature in design and we began seeing materials through new eyes. Combined with the many shared techniques and answered questions, our engaged audience of designers are sure to be inspired for years to come.
With feedback that this was one of the best events that we have ever had, I cannot recommend Françoise highly enough. She was gracious, professional, and accommodating- It was absolutely a pleasure working with and getting to know her.
Blakely Szosz, President, Rhode Island Federation of Garden Clubs, Barrington, RI
“My company signed on Françoise to be the featured designer for one of the largest design shows in our year. With around 250 people in attendance, Françoise didn’t miss a beat, explaining the actual “how-to” of her designs—something that our attendees crave. She took time to explain how she constructed each piece and even had different examples of “stages” of a design to better show the actual process. She was open to our requests for fall and winter designs and she was very flexible with product availability and specific elements that we wanted her to focus on throughout the show. Aside from that, she is just a downright delight to be around. Her personality is so warm and welcoming, you absolutely feel at ease with her—so down to earth and relatable! She also taught two hands-on Botanical Couture classes that we offered to our customers and all 40 seats sold out the day we posted the workshops! We have had such remarkable feedback from her time here—our customers absolutely loved her designs, found the inspiring and relatable, and very unique. Françoise is a true gem.”
Jessica Leopold AIFD, Design Manager, Koehler and Dramm Wholesale Florist, Minneapolis, MN
“The North Carolina Museum of Art had the great pleasure recently of welcoming Françoise Weeks as our special guest to Art in Bloom, our annual fundraising festival. Françoise spent the week in Raleigh delighting museum visitors and sharing her passion for flowers with new floral friends. Along with her spectacular talent and natural way with flowers she brought her warm, sunny personality and easy going charm. We were delighted to experience the woodlands through her eyes as she merged nature and fashion in skillfully crafted designs for two packed audiences. In addition, students came from across the US to learn her unique methods in a close up and personal setting and were rewarded with an entertaining workshop on botanical headpieces where they made headpieces of epic proportions.
Inviting Françoise to be our special guest gave her existing fans the opportunity to work with and learn from her, and introduced something new and unusual to those visitors who were previously unaware of her unique designs. We were thrilled to welcome her as part of this year’s event and very much hope she will return to a future Art in Bloom!”
Laura Finan, Project Manager, Art in Bloom, North Carolina Museum of Art