Debra Prinzing

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Episode 505: Growing Flowers with Niki Irving of Flourish Flower Farm

Wednesday, May 12th, 2021
Niki and William (left); Niki Irving (right), photographed at Flourish Flower Farm

Let’s welcome Niki Irving of Flourish Flower Farm of Asheville, N.C., a longtime Slow Flowers member, a flower farmer, florist, educator and now, author.

Just-picked North Carolina flowers, so beautiful! Photographed at Flourish Flower Farm.

Niki and her husband William own a nine-acre specialty cut flower farm nestled in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains. Niki farms more than 300 varieties of cut flowers and foliage and creates seasonally-inspired designs for weddings and special events. She sells her flowers wholesale both locally and nationally, motivated by  a belief that flowers make the world a more beautiful, joyful place.

Just released: “Growing Flowers,” by Niki Irving

Let’s jump into the conversation and talk all about Niki’s new book, “Growing Flowers.”

Niki (right) and a floral display at Flourish Flower Farm (left)

Enjoy these photos of Niki, a talented farmer-florist, and read through the Table of Contents to help you see the range of comprehensive information Niki shares in her new book.

Click here to order a signed copy from Niki

Find and follow Flourish Flower Farm at these social places.

Flourish Flower Farm on Facebook

Flourish Flower Farm on Instagram

A charming “Goody Box,” available from Niki’s website. Order details here.

Thanks to the generous donation from Niki’s publisher, we have two copies to give away to listeners. Here are the instructions:

  • Post a photo of one or more flowers you are growing and be sure to use the hashtag #growingflowers
  • Follow & tag @flourishflowerfarm, @slowflowerssociety and @mangopublishing.
  • We’ll gather up all of the posts on May 21st and announce the book recipients in our May 26th episode of Slow Flowers Podcast. Can’t wait to see your photos!

Camellia Faire’s concept for the PHS Philadelphia Flower Show exhibit 2021
More of Maura’s beautiful inspiration . . .

Before we meet our featured guest, I want to share a short bonus conversation with Maura Feeney of Camellia Faire Floral Studio, based in Philadelphia. You may know this talented floral artist by her former studio name Maura Rose Events, now rebranded as Camellia Faire.

Maura is a returning designer at this year’s PHS Philadelphia Flower Show and Slow Flowers is supporting her installation. Currently, she is seeking Slow Flower member growers to provide blooming plants to use at their exhibit called Rooted + Gathered. Maura isn’t asking for a donation — she has a budget to purchase the plants, and you’ll have promotional credit and receive photography from the exhibit. Check out details above and reach out to Maura at info@camelliafaire.com.


We’ve been talking all about floral books this week and so here’s another chance to participate in an online contest and win a copy of my new book Where We Bloom.

Details Flowers Software, one of our Resource section sponsors for the book is running a Where We Bloom Instagram Giveaway for the month of May.

Details challenges you to share your creative studio space by posting a photo on IG with the hashtag #wherewebloomdetails. Three top winners will receive a copy of Where We Bloom along with a FREE subscription to Details software.

Follow these rules to enter:


Thank you to our Sponsors

This podcast is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 880 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.

Farmgirl Flowers Banner

And thank you to our lead sponsor for 2021, Farmgirl Flowers. Farmgirl Flowers delivers iconic burlap-wrapped bouquets and lush, abundant arrangements to customers across the U.S., supporting more than 20 U.S. flower farms by purchasing more than $9 million dollars of U.S.-grown fresh and seasonal flowers and foliage annually, and providing competitive salaries and benefits to 240 team members based in Watsonville, California and Miami, Florida. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.

For each Podcast episode this year, we thank three of our Major Sponsors.

Thank you to Red Twig Farms, based in Johnstown, Ohio, a family-owned farm specializing in peonies, daffodils, tulips and branches, a popular peony-bouquet-by-mail program and their Spread the Hope Campaign where customers purchase 10 tulip stems for essential workers and others in their community. Learn more at redtwigfarms.com.

Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, a farmer-owned cooperative committed to providing the very best the Pacific Northwest has to offer in cut flowers, foliage and plants. The Growers Market’s mission is to foster a vibrant marketplace that sustains local flower farms and provides top-quality products and service to the local floral industry. Visit them at seattlewholesalegrowersmarket.com.

Our next sponsor thanks goes 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.


Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 724,000 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.

I value your support and invite you to show your thanks to support Slow Flowers’ ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right at debraprinzing.com

Debra Prinzing
(c) Mary Grace Long photography

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Podcast. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow 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 Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com

Music Credits:

Donnalee; Entwined Oddity; Turning on the Lights; Gaena
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

Episode 266: North Carolina’s Spring Forth Farm with Megan and Jonathan Leiss, Homesteaders and Flower Farmers

Wednesday, October 12th, 2016

Jonathan and Megan of Spring Forth Farm, a North Carolina homestead and sustainable flower farm. Photo by Bethany Cubino, Chasing Skies Photography

Jonathan and Megan of Spring Forth Farm, a North Carolina homestead and sustainable flower farm. Photo by Bethany Cubino, Chasing Skies Photography

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Earlier this year, in January, I received an email from Jonathan Leiss of Spring Forth Farm in Hurdle Mills, North Carolina. His message was ultimately responsible for today’s episode. After introducing himself, Jonathan wrote: “My favorite episodes are your interviews with farmers . . . I know you aren’t in the Southeast often, but if you are, I want to recommend the Durham-Chapel Hill area as a great place to visit to see the resurgence of local flowers on the small farm and the creative ways farmers and designers are building relationships with customers.”

I snapped these cute portraits of Jonathan and Megan at the Slow Flowers Creative Workshop in Durham last month (held at Pine State Flowers)

I snapped these cute portraits of Jonathan and Megan at the Slow Flowers Creative Workshop in Durham last month (held at Pine State Flowers)

The email continued as Jonathan listed many of the folks in the NC “Triangle” (which also includes Raleigh) who comprise the progressive flower farming and floral design community there.  I loved the inclusive point of Jonathan’s story — he told me about Spring Forth Farm and what he and his wife Megan are doing — and he listed florists and fellow farmers whose work is notable and worthy of my attention. “This is a very dynamic area for farming in general and right now that energy is reflected in the burst of local flowers on the market. If you are ever this way, please consider visiting . . . to see the energy of the American-Grown flower industry.”

Love the openness of this farm, with the blue of the sky and the blue farmhouse providing a consistent palette.

Love the openness of this farm, with the blue of the sky and the blue farmhouse providing a consistent palette.

It took some creativity with the scheduling and dozens of emails and a few phone calls, but that initial email from Jonathan sparked my interest in visiting an area of the country that I knew would teach me more about the Slow Flowers Movement. We have 23 Slow Flowers members in North Carolina and another five members in SC, so I felt the pull to connect on a more personal level.

Here's a quick group photo that we grabbed at the Slow Flowers Meet-Up before dusk.

Here’s a quick group photo that we grabbed at the Slow Flowers Meet-Up before dusk. We lost a few folks who were touring the flower field, but this is a representation of the amazing talent and passion of the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area.

Last month, I flew to Raleigh after several other travel stops, including attending the Field to Vase Dinner at Thistle Dew Farm in Quakertown, Pennsylvania and spending the previous day in NY’s Hudson Valley with emerging flower farmers and florists in that region.

READ MORE…