I know it’s May Day and perhaps that’s early to be thinking about Independence Day, but I want you to plan ahead for the second annual American Flowers Week celebration, which will take place June 28-July 4, 2016.

Today we announced the launch of American Flowers Week 2016. You can read the entire press release here. I wanted to get you the news early to encourage The Slow Flowers Community of farmers, designers, florists and wholesalers to have advance details for own marketing and social media activities.

Here are some of the ways you can get involved:

1. Download the “I’m Joining American Flowers Week” badge and add it to your web site, blog, or social sites. Please use #americanflowersweek when you post. We’ve hired Keyhole.co to track our social media impressions on Instagram and Twitter, so let’s make sure every single mention is counted!
2. Share our Social Media Tools, including graphics formatted for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Find those here. Please link to americanflowersweek.com when you do so! You can also follow and tag @myslowflowers on Instagram and Twitter. We’ll follow you back!
3. Create your own promotions! Some of our favorite ideas include designing a special bouquet or flower offering during American Flowers Week and advertising it to your customers. Use our graphics and encourage your own tribe to join the fun of this celebration. Create some floral fireworks!
   

   Our logo is available in 3 sizes for your use.

4. Design a Red-White-and-Blue bouquet and share it as part of our 50 States of American Flowers contest. This is open to all members of Slowflowers.com — you can sign up here, either as an individual or a team. Submit photography of a bouquet or arrangement between May 1st and June 15th and we’ll add it to our US Map of Flowers.
5. Share your ideas! We want to hear them — and your suggestions will encourage others to get involved.

Last year, in just 30 days, #americanflowersweek generated more than 400,000 impressions on Instagram and Twitter (Facebook is hard to track, so we didn’t count those — meaning, the number was likely even higher).

Let’s boost those numbers for 2016. In doing so, we’re changing the conversation about American Grown Flowers and the farmers and florists behind those blooms.

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Welcome to the final Slow Flowers Podcast episode of 2015.

Every single week this year; in fact, every single week for 2-1/2 years, I’ve had the immense privilege of hosting dynamic and inspiring dialogues with a leading voice in the American floral industry.

You’ve heard from flower farmers and floral designers who are changing the marketplace and how we view and consume the flowers in our lives.

As 2015 comes to a close, I would like to dedicate today’s episode to the Slow Flowers Highlights we’ve witnessed this year.

Next week, on January 6th, I will share my Floral Insights and Forecast for 2016 with you.

The past twelve months have built on the successes and shifts that began in previous years. Each time we turn the pages of the calendar to a New Year, we can applaud the strides made in the Slow Flowers movement.

I can date my own awareness to the American grown floral landscape to 2006 — that’s nearly a decade ago — when I met a very young mom named Erin Benzakein while I was scouting gardens in Mount Vernon, Washington.  She was growing sweet peas and had big ambitions.

Something about our conversation resonated with me. I was an established features writer with a huge home and garden portfolio. I’d written countless floral design stories for regional and national publications and yet it had never occurred to me that there was a great imbalance in the way flowers are grown and sourced in this country.

At the same time, my writer-pal Amy Stewart was working on a book about the global floral industry’s dark side, which was published the following year called Flower Confidential. She delved deep into the stories behind the status quo, and opened mine and countless others’ eyes to the extraordinary reasons nearly 80 percent of cut flowers sold in the U.S. were being imported.

Curious to learn more, I subscribed to Growing for Market, Lynn Byczynski’s newsletter for market farmers. I joined the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers and attended my first regional meeting in 2010, held at Charles Little & Co. in Eugene, Oregon, and later that year I went to the national meeting in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

I began connecting with flower farmers wherever I could, both in California where I was living at the time, and in Oregon and Washington. I met people virtually, as well, thanks to the ASCFG list-serves where I learned much about the issues facing small farms and American growers.

READ MORE…

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This week’s Slow Flowers Podcast guest is Tammy Myers, a Seattle studio florist with a focus on 100% American-grown flowers. Scroll down to read more, find links and to see photos of her design work.

It was completely fitting to interview Tammy during American Flowers Week, which just wrapped up July 4th with a fantastic level of involvement from flower farmers and floral designers all over the country.

From boutique growers to the largest flower farms in the country; from studio florists to grocery stores and wholesalers, too, we celebrated American Flowers Week as a grass roots education, promotion and advocacy campaign to highlight our nation’s flowers and foliage — and to raise awareness among consumers, the media and policymakers about supporting domestic flowers!

On Twitter and Instagram alone, mentions of #americanflowersweek generated more than 400k impressions in one month.

That’s pretty exciting for what was a mere idea six weeks ago!

Huge thanks to our top participants – without their intentional involvement and embrace of American Flowers Week, we would never have created so much beautiful buzz about this grassroots campaign.

Top post honors go to Farmgirl Flowers of San Francisco and Los Angeles for generating more than 3,500 likes on Instagram with a special “firecracker” bouquet promotion designed just for American Flowers Week. You rocked it, Farmgirl Team.

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I’ve been preoccupied with thoughts of Patriotism this week, especially with the Slow Flowers launch of American Flowers Week, which runs through today – July 4th.

Hundreds of folks have joined me in making red-white-and-blue floral arrangements and posting photos of their fields, flowers, bouquets and arrangements across the social media spectrum, all tagged with #americanflowersweek.

I’ve had a lot of fun making red-white-and-blue bouquets this week, too!

So, for a softer take on #americanflowersweek, may I present floral patriotism with pastels?

I love the distressed quality of this white cast-iron planter, recycled from a Better Homes & Gardens photo shoot from a few years back.

With a plastic liner converting it to a vase, the urn fits right into this week’s restful floral palette. P.S., I used a small flower frog, secured inside – for stabilizing the stems.

From my garden:

• Dusty Miller foliage ~ intensely white at this time of year

From Seattle Wholesale Growers Market:

• Pale peach foxgloves from Triple Wren Farms
• Astilbe from Ojeda Farms (purchased fresh last week, but preserved as a dry element)
• Globe thistle (Echinops sp.) and raspberry foliage from Jello Mold Farm
• Nigella ‘Black Cumin’ and double Shasta Daisies from Everyday Flowers

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We are in the middle of celebrating the inaugural American Flowers Week, June 29th through July 4th. We created American Flowers Week as a grass roots education, promotion and advocacy campaign to highlight our nation’s farms, florists, flowers and foliage — and to raise awareness among consumers, the media and policymakers about supporting domestic flowers!

If you haven’t joined in, there is plenty of time to get involved.

The easiest thing you can do is to make a red-white-and-blue bouquet using all American-grown, local and seasonal blooms. Please post that photo on your social sites and tag #americanflowersweek. I believe this effort will grow from a small idea into a significant annual event – and by adding your voice (and creativity) to American Flowers Week, you’re helping sing the praises of our homegrown blooms.

I’m so pleased today to introduce you to Jennifer Haf and Larissa Flynn of BLOOM Floral Design based on the beautiful North Michigan shore, in the communities of Petoskey/Charlevoix.

Jennifer founded BLOOM floral design in 2008 in response to her love for sharing cut garden flowers from her Northern Michigan backyard.

Having since studied under some of the most celebrated designers and with her team executed hundreds of regional and destination events, Jennifer radiates her love for all things natural into the designs BLOOM creates.

With a talented design team, BLOOM offers exclusive services to Northern Michigan and destination wedding clients — in fact, for 65 ceremonies this year alone.

Along with Jennifer, you’ll also meet Larissa Flynn, the creative director for BLOOM.

Trained as a graphic designer and fine artist, with extensive gallery and arts management experience, Larissa joined the floral business several years ago after meeting Jennifer and realizing they were creative kindred spirits.

I love the philosophy of BLOOM, as described on the studio’s web site:

We believe that flowers are most beautiful in their natural state.  When combined with other blooms in a customized palette, color and texture create a distinctive design that exudes the feeling you wish to create.  BLOOM sources flowers from only the finest growers, sourcing as much as we can locally and domestically.  Hand selected from tried and true varieties of the highest standards, our blooms will be sure to please.

Behind the scenes our creative team works meticulously at our production design studio where all of the magic happens the week leading up to your event.  Hand processing all of our flowers and prepping and designing each arrangement per event, our designs will charm and delight you and your guests.

As you will hear in our conversation, I recorded the interview with Jennifer and Larissa rather spontaneously – at a gathering hosted by Lisa Waud of pot and box and Detroit’s The Flower House, a prior guest of this podcast.

I had flown to Detroit for a 24-hour visit to attend the preview for this amazing art installation, which will be held over the weekend of October 16-18.

Jennifer and Larissa will create the florals for one of the rooms at The Flower House and I can’t wait to see what kind of botanical magic they conjure up.

Please follow links to all of BLOOM’s social sites, shared below. These are talented Slow Flowers floristas you will want to follow:

BLOOM on Facebook

BLOOM on Twitter

BLOOM on Pinterest

BLOOM on Instagram

Here’s a gallery of the beautiful design work from BLOOM Floral Design, used with their permission. These gorgeous images give me a keen sense of place and an appreciation for the character of their region’s landscape, climate and flora. A large percentage of their floral elements are local, Michigan-grown flowers. You’ll want to visit Northern Michigan at the peak of the season to see these lovelies yourself!

Listeners like you have downloaded this podcast more than 54,000 times. THANK YOU to each and every one of you for downloading, listening, commenting and sharing. It means so much.

Please join the American Flowers Week excitement and check out these resources to help your efforts. With your involvement, I believe this public awareness campaign will gain momentum and become an established annual event in the floral industry.

Until next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more American grown flowers on the table, one vase at a time. And If you like what you hear, please consider logging onto Itunes and posting a listener review.

The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.

The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Wheatley and Hannah Holtgeerts. Learn more about their work at shellandtree.com.

We have so many opportunities to celebrate local, seasonal and beautiful flowers and there’s no better one than welcoming Week 25 of the  Slow Flowers Challenge which coincides with the July 4th holiday.

Join me in clipping and arranging red-white-and-blue botanicals to honor the holiday.

I am so excited that all of the flowers in this week’s stellar arrangement came from one of my favorite flower farms,Charles Little & Co. of Eugene, Oregon. I visited this past week and received permission from Bethany Little to harvest to my heart’s content. Thank you, Bethany!

Tomorrow begins the inaugural American Flowers Weekcampaign, a tribute to the farmers who grow flowers in all 50 states, and to the artisans who interpret those flowers in bouquets, arrangements and other botanical beauty.

You are invited to take part in American Flowers Week by posting the flowers you grow and arrange on all social platforms with the hash-tag #americanflowersweek.

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Today, we’re celebrating the 100th episode of the Slow Flowers Podcast, a weekly program that’s all about American Flowers and the people who grow and design with them.

Reaching ONE HUNDRED EPISODES represents a significant milestone, as we have brought you hours and hours of programming on the vital topics ranging from saving our domestic flower farms to supporting a floral industry that relies on a safe, seasonal and local supply of flowers and foliage.

To me, it’s all about making a conscious choice and I invite you to join the conversation and the creative community. This podcast is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, nationwide online directory to florists, shops, and studios who design with American-grown flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms.  It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.

To commemorate the 100th episode of the Slow Flowers Podcast, we’re launching a very cool and I believe significant week-long education and outreach campaign that will kick off next Monday, June 29th and run through Saturday, July 4th.

Inspired by British Flowers Week, which has been the subject of two recent podcast episodes, the Slow Flowers Podcast and the Slowflowers.com online directory present: AMERICAN FLOWERS WEEK.

We’re kicking off American Flowers Week with a fabulous logo identifying the campaign, designed by Iowa-based illustrator and artist Jean Zaputil of Studio Z Design & Photography.

You are welcome to visit our new American Flowers Week web site where you can download and use the logo and other resources for your own promotional efforts efforts. Click here to find our Press Kit and links to a Flickr gallery featuring local flowers and floral arrangements representing all 50 states.

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