A while back I had the opportunity to design a floral arrangement for the Spectrum Gala. In total the gala raised a ton for the DeVos Children's Hospital, a cause that I dedicate a fair amount of time and financial support to.
The theme of the gala was "fairy tale." My instruction was to create a floral arrangement inspired by a fairy tale to be auctioned off at the event. The tale I chose was "Where the Wild Things Are" by Maurice Sendak. It has been a favourite of mine since childhood.
The plot of the book is based on the fantasized (and real) consequences of a little boy’s mischief. Max’s imagination transforms his bedroom into an extraordinary setting with a forest, an ocean and a little that Max sails in until he comes to a land full of “wild things.” The deep, richly saturated colors, incredible texture and depth of the illustrations from this book inspired me to create this arrangement. My objective was to gather as many of the components from the forest near my home. NK and I scoured the woods and marshes for tree bark, moss and interesting plants. The live flowers I got from Horrocks Market, and I supplemented it with vegetables from my local Asian grocer.
The base for the arrangment was an awesome piece of tree bark - I absoutely fell in LOVE with the little plants sprouting out from under the different layers.
The first part I completed was little flower pouf ball with a tiny mushroom peeking out.
I tried to mix as many textures and saturated colours as I could without going overboard.
The final product! In total there were about 20 different centerpieces that were auctioned off. I was pretty pleased with the result - so organic looking!
