Debra Prinzing

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Episode 697: Best of 2024 (Encore) Secrets of a Sustainable Wedding Florist with Jessica Stewart of Pittsburgh’s Bramble & Blossom

Thursday, January 2nd, 2025
Jessica Stewart Bramble & Blossom
Jessica Stewart of Bramble & Blossom

Happy New Year! We’ve pulled one of our most popular episodes of 2024 to share with you today and I know it will inspire you with new sustainability ideas for the coming wedding season! Meet Jessica Stewart, a pioneering Slow Flowers floral designer, and learn how she leads with joy when communicating her values to wedding clients, while also infusing her aesthetic with sustainable values. This episode is called Secrets of a Sustainable Wedding Florist so get ready to be inspired.

New Year, New You $50 Off ticket promotion for the Slow Flowers WORLDWIDE Summit 2025
New Year, New YOU at the Slow Flowers WORLDWIDE Summit 2025

It’s a busy time over here at the Slow Flowers Society with all of our efforts focused on producing an amazing, first-ever Slow Flowers WORLDWIDE Summit – coming right up next week over three packed days – January 9-11, 2025. This is an all online/virtual conference so you have no excuse to skip it! You’ll be able to log in and watch 15 hours of inspiring floral education and connect with each speaker personally – or, if your schedule doesn’t allow that, you will have access to the replay sessions for three full months that follow. By the way, if you’re listening on January 2nd, we’re still in the midst of our NEW YEAR NEW YOU $50 off flash sale, which continues through midnight PT on Friday, January 3rd. Click below to grab your registration and save! Slow Flowers members receive an additional $50 off as a member benefit!


Romance in bloom
Romance in bloom by Bramble & Blossom

We pulled today’s encore Episode from the archives as one of our top shows from 2024. Stay tuned for the wrap up – when I’ll share a business update recorded with Jessica Stewart earlier this week – you’ll love hearing what’s happening with Bramble & Blossom these days!

Replaying this episode seems well timed, because it’s engagement season and many of our wedding and event designers are busy, consulting with prospective couples and pulling together concepts and proposals. For Slow Flowers designers, those who infuse their business values with sourcing and sustainable considerations, there’s an important added layer involved.

Jessica is well aware of the importance of educating clients about having a local and seasonal approach to designing their wedding flowers. We asked Jessica to unpack all the elements involved in running Bramble & Blossom, and to share her approach to communication during the sales process.

Jessica shared an incredibly detailed presentation for the January 2024 Slow Flowers Member (virtual) meetup and we recorded it to share, originally as Episode 646 on January 24, 2024. Whether you caught that episode or this is your first time hearing it, you’ll be treated to Jessica’s approach about how she designs for seasonality and sources from local flower farms to produce gorgeous, romantic, evocative weddings.

Jessica’s presentation includes details on how she prepares contracts + proposals; and how she sources and plans for weddings and installations. Her expertise is priceless and you’ll want to listen in.

Joy and Intentionality
Joy and Intentionality come across through florals

Here’s a little bit more about Jessica Stewart of Brambles & Blossom, an Eco-Friendly Pittsburgh Wedding Florist:

The tagline for Bramble & Blossom includes these guiding principles: Ethical. Sustainable. Anti-Racist. Inclusive. Accessible. Intentional. Stunning. You’ll notice these characteristics in each Bramble & Blossom design, and in turn, realize how special and rare these qualities area. As Jessica writes on her website: “This seems like a #HumbleBrag at first glance. But the truth is, we wish there was more competition.”

Brooklyn Gathering December 2014
Here’s a fun photo from our NYC-Brooklyn Slowflowers.com gathering. From left: Gloria Battista Collins of GBC Style, me, Jessica Stewart and Justine Lacy of Foxglove Floral Design Studio, and Molly Culver of Molly Oliver Flowers.

Before we jump right into Jessica’s presentation, I want to pause and mention how much I appreciate this gifted woman and her support as a Slow Flowers member. As you’ll hear in our opening conversation, I first met Jessica and her former partner Justine Lacey when they owned Foxglove Floral Design Studio in Brooklyn. They women appeared on episode 136 of the Slow Flowers Podcast – in April 2014, during the first year of this podcast. It is so encouraging to me to continue that conversation now, and to realize that one decade later Jessica remains committed to her sustainable values.

Find and Follow Bramble & Blossom on Instagram


Thank you to our Sponsors

This show is brought to you by slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 750 florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.

Royal Anthos Lily Bulbs

Thank you to our lead sponsor, Flowerbulb.eu and their U.S. lily bulb vendors. One of the most recognizable flowers in the world, the lily is a top-selling cut flower, offering long-lasting blooms, year-round availability, and a dazzling petal palette. Flowerbulb.eu has partnered with Slow Flowers to provide beautiful lily inspiration and farming resources to help growers and florists connect their customers with more lilies. Learn more at Flowerbulb.eu.

Thank you to Longfield Gardens, which provides home gardeners with high quality flower bulbs and perennials. Their online store offers plants for every region and every season, from tulips and daffodils to dahlias, caladiums and amaryllis. Check out the full catalog at Longfield Gardens at longfield-gardens.com.

Thank you to Rooted Farmers. Rooted Farmers works exclusively with local growers to put the highest-quality specialty cut flowers in floral customers’ hands. When you partner with Rooted Farmers, you are investing in your community, and you can expect a commitment to excellence in return. Learn more at RootedFarmers.com.


Slow Flowers Podcast Logo with flowers, recorder and mic

Thank you for joining me today! The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than one million times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at SlowFlowersSociety.com.


Debra in the Slow Flowers Cutting Garden
Thank you for listening! Sending love, from my cutting garden to you! (c) Missy Palacol Photography

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. 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. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. Thanks so much for joining us today and I’ll see you next week!


Music Credits:

Drone Pine; Gaena; Waterbourne; Welcome Home Sonny; Cast in Wicker
by Blue Dot Sessions
http://www.sessions.blue

Lovely
by Tryad 
http://tryad.bandcamp.com/album/instrumentals
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

In The Field
audionautix.com

SLOW FLOWERS Podcast: Meet the Foxglove Brooklyn design team – and hear of their search for seasonal and local blooms (Episode 136)

Wednesday, April 9th, 2014

 

new_foxglove_header

An email arrived in my in-box last month from Justine Lacy and Jessica Stewart, two supporters of my recent Slowflowers.com campaign. I had sent them a thank-you message after they contributed on Indiegogo, and it prompted this reply:

Justine Lacey (left) and Jessica Stewart (right) are a young, dynamic floral duo committed to seasonal and locally-grown flowers in their designs. Photo credit (c) Judie

Justine Lacey (left) and Jessica Stewart (right) are a young, dynamic floral duo committed to seasonal and locally-grown flowers in their designs. Photo credits (c) Judie Zevack and courtesy of Foxglove Floral Design Studio.

 

This is what spring looks like in the hands of Foxglove's designers.

This is what spring looks like in the hands of Foxglove’s designers.

“Hello Debra, this is Justine, Jessica’s business partner here at Foxglove Floral Design Studio in Brooklyn. We are ardent fans of your work – both your floral designs and your leadership and activism in the slow flower movement (and your great podcast!).

“We’ve been following your Indiegogo campaign as we’ve found it an exciting challenge, and a challenge nonetheless, to help our clients connect with local farmers in the New York/New Jersey area. We do love the wholesale market in Chelsea and love to work with fantastic European blooms, and we like getting to know the growers in our area who are providing the more local options, like flowering branches in spring. However, we are very (very) ready for your directory of like-minded, slow flower-inclined designers, growers, wholesalers, etc.  I’m currently reading Amy Stewart’s “Flower Confidential” and finding that the more we know, the more we want to source local!

“On that note, the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market is so inspiring – one day, Jessica and I would love to help New York (or even Brooklyn) create a wholesale market dedicated to local flowers! With the amazing flowers grown (and wild) that thrive in our seasons here, it would certainly be a dream come true for many. 
 
“We’d love to chat with you a bit more regarding ways that we, and other New York florists we’re connected with, can provide more local flower options for their clients. If you would be available for a phone chat, or even via email, to answer some questions about how Foxglove can further strengthen our relationships with farmers and connect more of our clients to local options.”
 
A gorgeous example of Justine and Jessica's design work.

A gorgeous example of Justine and Jessica’s design work.

Well that introduction led to a promised phone date that we scheduled in late March. And I am pleased to share what we discussed with you today. You see, Jessica and Justine agreed to let me record our hour-long conversation for this podcast. We’ve condensed it a little, but you can follow along from the beginning to the end ~ and I promise you’ll gain important insights into today’s challenges facing progressive floral designers who truly desire for their work to be local, seasonal and sustainable.

Let me tell you a little bit about these two innovators:

Foxglove Floral Design Studio specializes in thoughtful, naturally-styled arrangements for weddings and other special events. The studio is committed to celebrating regional and native flora and is proud to partner with local farms to bring seasonal flowers to their clients during the growing season. Foxglove also works with other American and European growers to source ethically and sustainably grown blooms throughout the year.

Based in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Foxglove serves all of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and will happily work on location elsewhere. We love to create one-of-a-kind floral and event designs for our clients and celebrate every kind of love.

Justine grew up in Charleston, SC. She misses the wisteria in the spring and the winter camelias. And lots of fresh shrimp. Jessica is a Western PA native, and has been gardening since childhood. She loves beets and books and long car rides. 

More seasonally-inspired work from Foxglove.

More seasonally-inspired work from Foxglove. 

 

Beautiful palette of locally-grown flowers!

Beautiful palette of locally-grown flowers! 

 

A styled photo shoot at Straw Hill Farm, one of Justine and Jessica's floral sources.

A styled photo shoot at Straw Hill Farm, one of Justine and Jessica’s floral sources.

 

 

Sweet and personal - a little gem of a design.

Sweet and personal – a little gem of a design.

Whether you are a flower farmer who is eager to understand the needs of eco-conscious floral designers OR a floral designer who’s experiencing some of the same challenges that Jessica and Justine are facing, I know that today’s conversation will be inspiring and relevant. Thanks for joining us. 

The floral marketplace realities that Justine and Jessica are experiencing is both a challenge and an opportunity – and I’ve heard these same concerns from others around the country, designers who are frustrated with the challenge of finding an American-grown-minded wholesaler to work with or anyone else who will help their studio source farm-grown flowers from domestic fields and greenhouses. 

In the coming weeks, you will hear additional chapters of this ongoing conversation, with farmers, florists and the “middle-man” wholesaler . . . and I expect that together we’ll begin to see a shift in the sentiments. Let’s turn frustration into possibilities and opportunities. Together, let’s redefine the floral industry and heal the broken model we’ve had to endure for so long. I welcome your suggestions for people and businesses to include in the dialogue.

Because of the support from you and others, listeners have downloaded episodes of the Slow Flowers Podcast more than 9,500  times! I thank you for taking the time to join to my conversations with flower farmers, florists and other notable floral experts.

If you like what you hear, please consider logging onto Itunes and posting a listener review.

Until next week please join me in putting more American grown flowers on the table, one vase at a time. 

 The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Hannah Holtgeerts. Learn more about her work at hhcreates.net.