Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

I have a great interview to share with you today — and it includes a virtual visit to Bitterroot Flower Shop in Missoula, Montana, where I caught up with owner Lindsay Irwin.

I first met Lindsay through fellow Slow Flowers members Carly Jenkins and Jamie Rogers of Killing Frost Farm. and their wholesale venture Farm to Florist Montana. They consider Bitterroot Flower Shop one of the top customers for their fresh, seasonal and local Montana-grown flowers.

Over the years, on a few different visits to Montana, I’ve come to know Lindsay. She is active in the Montana Florists Association, having served as president in the recent past.  A few years ago, I was invited to speak at the MFA annual conference and we were hosted at Lindsay’s shop, Bitterroot, a sizeable retail and production space located at a strategic intersection in downtown Missoula. I was so impressed by the many conversations I had with florists across the state . . . including Lindsay, who are pursuing new sourcing models with local flower farmers.

Last summer, Killing Frost Farm reached out and asked if they could buy a gift membership in Slow Flowers Society for Lindsay — as a thank you for her support of their farm and their flowers. I was so touched by that creative way a flower farm connected on a deeper level with a key customer — and it’s a great client gift idea for other flower farmers to consider!

That gesture brought Lindsey and me together, too. When I was in Missoula earlier this month, she and I recorded an audio conversation, which you’ll hear today. We also recently recorded a virtual design demonstration, which appears at the top of this post. The flowers she used are all Montana-grown, along with beautiful fruiting raspberry branches from Killing Frost Farm and some California eucalyptus.

Let’s jump right in and meet Lindsey Irwin of Bitterroot Flower Shop in Missoula, Montana.

Follow Bitterroot Flower Shop on Facebook

Find Bitterroot Flower Shop on Instagram

Bonus: Listen to my 2020 interview (Episode 473) with Jamie Rogers about how Killing Frost Farm is getting more Montana-grown flowers into the hands of Montana florists!

---

Thanks so much for joining me today! As October gets underway, this is the first podcast episode of the month featuring visits that highlight our members and the ways they share the Slow Flowers Message with their customers and marketplace. Join me, each Wednesday, for a new live-stream video interview on YouTube and our Facebook page, and here on the Slow Flowers Podcast for the audio conversation.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Connect with Slow Flowers Society for our Facebook Live Content

---

As I mentioned last week, October is Slow Flowers Member Appreciation Month! We have lots planned each day of this month to connect with you and others in our community. This Friday, be sure to join our Member Virtual Meet-Up — and hear from two members, retail florists who will share their marketing and branding tips to leverage the Slow Flowers message to their customers.

We’ve invited Sarah Reyes of Wildflower & Fern based in Oakland, Calif., and Toni Reale of Roadside Blooms, based in North Charleston, S.C., to discuss some of the ways they have successfully developed Slow Flowers’ messaging, marketing & PR, and consumer education programs that underscore their values about sourcing and sustainability.
Bring your questions!! 

Here is the LINK to pre-register — and we’d love to see you this Friday, October 8th in the zoom room at 9 am pacific.noon eastern.

---

Thank you to our Sponsors!

This show 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.

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. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.

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.

Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com.

Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.

---

Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 772,000 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.

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. 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. You can learn more about Andrew’s work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:

Molly Molly; Turning on the Lights; Gaenaby
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; Redwood Trail
audionautix.com

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

I have a very special treat for you. Earlier this month, I traveled to Missoula, Montana, where I gave the opening presentation to the Montana Cut Flower Workshop. The conference planners asked me to share a national overview of the insights and forecast for the Slow Flowers Movement, including flower farming and floral design trends.

Immediately following my presentation was Julio Freitas, a longtime Slow Flowers member and owner of The Flower Hat, based in Bozeman. Julio originally entered the floral world as the designer of phenomenal weddings and events, but that pat led him to flower farming. He shared the how and why that happened in his lecture, which he graciously permitted me to record to feature today.

The Flower Hat is a floral design studio and flower farm located in Bozeman, MT. In Julio’s very short season, he grows thousands and thousands of beautiful flowers for use in dozens of weddings throughout Spring, Summer and Fall.

The farming side of his business originated on a 1,800 sq ft parcel when Julio couldn’t get his hands on the quality of botanicals he needed for design work. Over the years, that growing space expanded to 1/4 acre, including leased land, to accommodate The Flower Hat’s demand for more flowers.  Today, The Flower Hat occupies five acres in Bozeman, Montanta.

I’m excited for you to hear from Julio about his approach to selling flowers to fellow florists. I know it will be beneficial. If you’re a florist, you’ll learn a thing or two about how to source from local flower farmers; and if you’re a grower, the tips Julio shares are priceless.

Below you will links to Julio’s social places. Visit his website to sign up for his newsletter, which means you’ll be the first to learn about the fall bulb sale that starts in just a few weeks on October 15th, and get advance details on Julio’s 2022 workshop series.

Check out “Montana Mentor,” my feature about The Flower Hat workshops that appeared in the January 2020 issue of Slow Flowers Journal for Florists’ Review (link below).

Follow The Flower Hat on Instagram

Find The Flower Hat on Facebook

---

BLOOM Imprint New Releases: Pre-Orders Open

Just a little news to share with you about BLOOM Imprint, our book publishing division of Slow Flowers. We have just posted pre-ordering for two new books, out later this year. Pre-orders are open for A Life in Flowers, by Holly Heider Chapple, which will be released at the end of October. Be inspired by Holly’s story and learn all about her floral design aesthetic, her innovations, her mentorship and community building, and Hope Flower Farm in Virginia, where she has established a center for floral education.
You also can pre-order Felicia Alvarez’s new book on growing garden roses for the floral design, called Growing Wonder, based on her experience as a rose farmer and educator. This is the only rose book developed with our Slow Flowers Community in mind — because it is focused on rose selection, cultivation, harvest, post-harvest care and crop management for cutting gardens and flower farms. This book will be released in January. And if you’re over at bloomimprint.com, you can also order my signed copies of our first book, Where We Bloom, perfect for the gardener and flower lover in your life.

---

Thank you to our Sponsors

This show 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.

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. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.

Roadie, an on-demand delivery company offering affordable same-day and scheduled delivery. With a network of friendly, local drivers who handle each delivery with care, and one-on-one support from a designated account manager, Roadie guarantees a smooth and reliable delivery experience–from pickup to delivery. Sign up for your first delivery at Roadie.com/slowflowers and use promo code slowflowers–that’s one word–to get five dollars off.

Flowerfarm.com, a leading wholesale flower distributor that sources from carefully-selected flower farms to offer high-performing fresh flowers sent directly from the farm straight to you. Find flowers and foliage from California, Florida, Oregon and Washington by using the “Origin” selection tool in your search. It’s smarter sourcing. Learn more at flowerfarm.com.

The Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.

---

Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 767,000 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

---

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. 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. You can learn more about Andrew’s work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:

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; Redwood Trail
audionautix.com

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

Two weeks ago, you heard from Shannon Algiere and Jessica Galen as we discussed the 2020 Young Farmers & Cooks Conference, held last week as a virtual event attracting more than one thousand attendees. Shannon and Jessica shared the story of Stone Barn Center for Food & Agriculture and gave us a preview of the conference. I want to thank Shannon, a Slow Flowers member, Stone Barns Center’s resident flower growing expert, farm liaison manager and co-director of the Arts & Ecology Lab for inviting me to gather together and moderate a flower-focused panel — and I’d like to share the audio of that presentation with you today episode.

You’ll hear from four Slow Flowers members each of whom discussed her or his unique approach to agricultural entrepreneurship. They include Aishah Lurry, Patagonia Flower Farm, Julio Freitas, The Flower Hat, Taij Cotten and VC (Victoria) Edwards-Cotten, Perry-winkle Farm, and Julius Tillery, Black Cotton U.S.
As I said at the beginning of our panel, clearly, I am not a YOUNG FARMER, but through my passion for the Slow Flowers Movement I hope to shine a light on several of our members: flower farming pioneers you’ll meet today.

Taij & Victoria (VC) Cotten, of Perry-winkle Farm in Pittsboro, North Carolina

After responding to a Craigslist ad for Valentine’s Day in 2017 at Preston Flower Shop, Taij and Victoria were hooked on flowers. They quit their jobs and traveled North Carolina’s Piedmont farming region, talking with any farmer that had time for them. They quickly realized they wanted to farm. 

Now farming alongside their mentors and “farm-ily,” Michael Perry and Cathy Jones of Perry-winkle Farm, the young couple helps sustainably farm 4 acres in Northern Chatham County, North Carolina, specializing in seasonal vegetables, specialty cut flowers and pasture laying hens. Perry-winkle farm attends 3 regional farmers’ markets: Fearrington Village (a seasonal market) and 2 Carrboro Farmers markets (one seasonal and one year round). Taij and Victoria reside in Chatham County, NC with their two adorable, flower-loving children: Carleigh (6) and Titus (1)

I first met Taij and Victoria at the 2018 Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers annual conference in Raleigh, when destiny made sure we were seated together at the same banquet table. I’ve been following their adventures on social media ever since and am delighted to welcome them today.

Find and follow Perry-winkle Farm and Taij & Victoria

Perry-winkle Farm on Facebook

Perry-winkle Farm on Instagram

Taij & Victoria on Instagram

---

Julius Tillery, founder and CEO of Black Cotton U.S. Julius is the NC State Coordinator for the Black Family Land Trust. He is a 5th Generation life-long row crop commodities producer (cotton, soybeans, peanuts) from Northeastern, North Carolina. He has worked as an advocate and resource provider in the North Carolina agriculture and environmental sectors since 2009. Julius has also worked at Rural Advancement Foundation international and The Conservation Fund. He currently serves on the Southern Administrative Council for SARE (that’s the Sustainable Agriculture, Research and Education Council) and the North Carolina Forestry Advisory Council.

Julius is a rural economic development advocate and is also known for his entrepreneurial business role as Founder of BlackCotton U.S. You can find Julius anywhere between his farm working on producing crops, on another farmer’s farm helping consult with new enterprise development, or any meeting that is focused on improving the lives of farmers and farming communities across the USA. Julius is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in Economics and minor in Entrepreneurship in 2008.

Find and follow Black Cotton U.S.

Follow Black Cotton U.S. on Facebook

Follow Black Cotton U.S. on Instagram

---

Aishah Lurry, founder and CEO of Patagonia Flower Farms based in Patagonia, Arizona. She is an artistic florist who combines her love for water-wise and organic farming techniques to produce affordable, healthy, and fresh-cut flowers.

As a gardener who began her flower farming career in 2017, Aishah started her micro-farm on her home’s property after getting tired of driving 20miles out of town to buy overpriced and imported flowers that she didn’t like. By merging her expertise and knowledge of crop planning, propagation, harvesting, drying, and arranging, Aishah was able to turn her beloved hobby into a thriving business that celebrates eco-consciousness and the local economy. 

Aishah has taught several classes about sprouts, micro-greens, and propagation and today serves with Borderlands Restoration Network to further its native species and public education programs.

She considers her flowers a local, affordable, and well-deserved luxury. Each flower in Aishah’s hand-picked bouquets are lovingly grown to ensure health, vibrancy, and longevity of the ingredients.

Find and follow Patagonia Flower Farm

Patagonia Flower Farm on Facebook

Patagonia Flower Farm on Instagram

Listen to our past Slow Flowers Podcast episode with Aishah Lurry of Patagonia Flower Farm

---

And finally Julio Freitas, owner of The Flower Hat. The Flower Hat is a floral design studio and flower farm nestled in the beautiful mountains of Gallatin Valley in Bozeman, Montana. The Studio is headed by internationally published designer Julio Freitas, whose design style embraces the seasons to create a loose, natural aesthetic that has graced hundreds of events, including many high profile and celebrity weddings.

In an attempt to provide his clients with the best blooms, Julio decided to incorporate a Flower Farming component to the business operation. He started his growing operations on 1,800 sq ft and quickly leased ¼ acre plot for a few years, where he was able to grow and harvest thousands of flowers by using high intensity techniques. These locally grown flowers are truly the treasures that make his designs so spectacular.

Today, The Flower Hat is a thriving company that stays busy during the summer with weddings, selling flowers to florists and wholesalers. The company is also known for its coveted dahlia tubers that sell out in a matter of minutes that go on sale on February 1, 2020. Julio regularly hosts on-farm summer workshop intensive that go deep into the business model that makes The Flower Hat such a successful little company. The classes combine hand-on floral design experience, the business behind weddings and events and small scale flower farming.

Julio also finds room in his schedule to share everything he knows with others through floral design demonstrations as well as presentations about his high-intensity flower farming techniques on his Facebook Group The Flower Hat Exchange.

Find and follow The Flower Hat

The Flower Hat on Facebook

The Flower Hat on Instagram

Listen to our past Slow Flowers Podcast episode with Julio Freitas of The Flower Hat

I posed three questions for discussion:
1. First, I asked each panelist to share an overview of their floral enterprise. Who they are, what do they produce/grow? where are they located and how long have they been farming.

2. Next, we talked about how flowers are part of their farm’s business model, how they sell and what market do they serve?

3. Finally, why flowers? Why grow flowers instead of food OR why integrate flowers in into a food-growing operation

---

Thanks so much for joining us today. What a great session. We did have some audio and technical challenges, so I promise to bring Julius Tillery from Black Cotton U.S. for a full episode in the near future, and I hope to also host a longer podcast conversation with Taij and Victoria.

Coming up, we have just two more episodes for 2020. Next week, on December 23rd, is our annual Slow Flowers Holiday Music Special Episode, featuring the talents of a Slow Flowers member whose life is influenced by both music and flowers. And on Wednesday, December 30th, the final episode of 2020, I’ll share our Year in Review with you. On the horizon, the first episode of 2021 will feature our 2021 Slow Flowers Floral Insights and Industry Forecast.

The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 669,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much.

Asking for your Support

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. 2020 has been a challenging year for all of us and we have continued to deliver fresh, original content to you through the Slow Flowers Podcast, week in and week out — since 2013!

Not counting all of the time invested in developing the topics, guests and content, we spend more than $10k annually to bring you this award-winning internet radio program. Your financial support can ensure we continue into 2021. If every listener contributes just $2, those funds would add up quickly to cover our out-of-pocket costs to record, edit, host and promote the Slow Flowers Podcast. Would you consider making a year-end donation? 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

Thank you to our Sponsors!

This podcast is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, nationwide online directory to 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.

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.

Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.

The Gardener’s Workshop, which offers a full curriculum of online education for flower farmers and farmer-florists. Online education is more important this year than ever, and you’ll want to check out the course offerings at thegardenersworkshop.com.

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Podcast. 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 Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:

Open Flames; 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

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

The conversation I recorded recently with today’s featured guest began much earlier this year. I learned so much from flower farmer Jamie Rogers, one half of Killing Frost Farm, while pulling together a segment of a lecture about flower farm diversification. And much of what Jamie and I discussed when I called him back in February was in some ways prophetic. At the time, we could not have predicted the COVID-19 pandemic and what it would mean to the floral marketplace.

Jamie and his partner Carly Jenkins founded Killing Frost Farm in Missoula, Montana, in 2012. Carly shared some of their story when I first interviewed her for the Slow Flowers Podcast, episode 296, aired in May 2017. I’ll be sure to share a link to that episode, and to a subsequent appearance when she and I discussed the woodland-inspired lichen and moss gown for American Flowers Week 2018, episode 355. 

Here’s a bit of their background, which originally appeared on their website a few year’s back: In 2012, Carly and Jamie bought a house on a single city lot in Missoula’s Westside neighborhood. The soil was rocky, ant-infested and barren. They tilled, weeded, and with a truckload of compost, began growing tomatoes, herbs and flowers.

In 2014, the house next door went on the market, and after a bit of financial finagling, the couple made an offer. With more soil to work, their gardening ambitions grew, and before long, taking care of their plants was not only tough on schedules, but hard on the wallet. A financially savvy friend recommended Carly and Jamie find a way to form an LLC, sell some of what they grew and treat those mounting gardening expenses as a business expense. By the fall of that year, they grew their first batch of microgreens. A week after the ground was frozen, they delivered some to a neighborhood restaurant, and Killing Frost Farm was born.

When I first posted that introduction to Jamie and Carly, back in 2017, I concluded: A lot has happened since then, including forming established relationships with local chefs and growing other types of produce for them. Carly and Jamie also upped the number of flower beds and sold edible flowers . . .  before narrowing their focus to cut flowers for floral arrangements.

As they wrote on their web site: “It has been a frightening, stress-inducing, humbling ride so far, but it’s allowed us to quit our old jobs and spend our days working in dirt, together.”

Today’s episode will catch you up on what Jamie and Carly have been up to in the past few years. They moved to Potomoc, a town about a 30-minute drive east of Missoula, where Killing Frost now has 2-plus acres for its cut flower production.

As you’ll hear in this conversation, the couple now focuses almost entirely on selling flowers wholesale through their weekly Market in Missoula, where florists can shop off the floor and pick up pre-orders. To grow, they began in earnest delivering flowers to customers (studio and retail florists) in Butte, Bozeman, Helena and often to other markets when supply allowed.

They just wrapped up the 2020 season for running a Montana-grown delivery program, marketing Killing Frost’s fresh flowers as well as crops grown by a number of other farms. Spearheaded by Jamie, the program will not stop just because dahlia season is over. As he discusses in our interview, there are plans to add dried flowers and holiday greenery to the product availability list moving forward through the end of the year.

I think you’ll pick up on the fact that Jamie is personable, committed to excellent customer service, and a whole lot of fun. As he shares, the Killing Frost model is based on one originated by Ralph Thurston and Jeriann Sabin, founders and former owners of Bindweed Flower Farm.

Our conversation is an honest one and I appreciate Jamie’s transparency about the challenges of building a bucket truck route in a marketplace where customers have not had access to locally-grown flowers for decades. As he told me earlier: “We need them more than they need us. If you get that notion, Jamie said, you’ll be rewarded, because remember: they have just been buying flowers from someone else for nine months of the year.“

Find and follow Killing Frost Farm on Instagram

Thank you so much for joining me today! At the end of our interview, I had a big grin on my face — Jamie has a way of lifting my spirits. I hope you pick up on his enthusiasm and passion for getting more Montana-grown flowers in to the hands of the state’s florists on a regular basis. As he told me about his sales and customer service strategy: “We have to make it as convenient for them as possible. We are really lucky that they want to buy our flowers.”

Before I close, I want to highlight a couple of items and ask you to keep an eye out for our October happenings. Our October newsletter launches this week, as does our 2021 member survey. I hope you take a moment to click on the survey if it lands in your in-box — we are eager to glean insights and input from you to help shape the coming year’s themes and programs. To sweeten the deal and thank you for your investment of valuable time, we will send a special gift to everyone who completes the survey. And all respondents who complete the survey and share their contact information with us will be entered into a drawing for a full registration to the 2021 Slow Flowers Summit, valued at $599.

The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 645,000 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 the American cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.

Thank you to our Sponsors

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.

And thank you to Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. Read our stories at slowflowersjournal.com.

The Gardener’s Workshop, which offers a full curriculum of online education for flower farmers and farmer-florists. Online education is more important this year than ever, and you’ll want to check out the course offerings at thegardenersworkshop.com.

Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.

Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Podcast. 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 Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:

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; River Meditation
audionautix.com

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

I’m so excited this week to introduce you to April Vomfell of Flathead Farmworks in Kalispell, Montana. We recorded this interview in person on March 14th at Hitomi Gilliam’s Trend Summit in Vancouver, B.C., Canada. At the time, I don’t think April or I really understood that life as we knew it would come crashing to a halt when we both traveled home the following day. So it makes our interview all the more special. I’m glad you’ll hear it and I hope you’ll find our optimism contagious in these uncertain times.

But first, our bonus series here on the Slow Flowers Podcast continues with our next installment of Stories of Resilience. I believe that now, more than ever, the message of sustainability and seasonal and locally-available flowers is top of mind — among consumers, flower farmers and florists.

I want the Slow Flowers Podcast to be a companion to those of you in isolation, away from your physical community of peers, neighbors, customers and friends. I don’t have many answers, but I do want to keep the lines of communication open and accessible through this platform.

About that Resilience. I invited Tammy Myers of LORA Bloom to share what she’s experiencing as a floral entrepreneur. Based in Fall City, Washington, east of Seattle, Tammy is a past guest of this podcast. She first appeared in 2015 when I featured her studio First & Bloom and its All-American-grown branding. Later, in 2017, I spoke with Tammy and fellow designer Maura Whalen of Casablanca Floral as they discussed “Flower Power,” a collective of local Seattle area florists and farmer-florists.

In the “About” page on her new LORA Bloom web site, Tammy says she will never forget the first time she discovered the difference between locally-sourced flowers and the alternative — imported ones. 

“Very early in my first business, First & Bloom, I explored wholesale options in Seattle.  I walked into the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market and I thought I had died and gone to heaven.  I found buckets and buckets of freshly cut blooms in every color and shape. Blooms that were grown by flower farmers and cut from the fields just hours before.  All the textures, the rich colors and hues, the sweet fragrant smell of flowers, and the hardworking faces of the farmers themselves captured my heart. I do believe it was then in that moment, when I fell in love with the floral industry. It was there I found my people.  My tribe. It was incredible.”

She soon learned the reason this uncommon wholesaler existed as a fresh alternative in the floral industry – thanks to its steady supply of local and seasonal flowers. A great deal has happened since that day six years ago. After years as a florist and a small business owner Tammy wanted to find a new way to connect with customers and increase her online presence.  Hearing the same frustrations from friends in the floral business, she set out to change how consumers purchase flowers online. With LORA Bloom, Tammy hopes to change the flower shopping experience to give consumers a way to experience local and sustainable choices. LORA Bloom is committed to sourcing primarily American grown florals and absolutely never uses floral foams in designs.   

Find and follow LORA Bloom at these social places:

LORA Bloom on Facebook

LORA Bloom on Instagram

30 Day Social Media Action Plan from Kalyx Group

Tammy discussed using a 14-day social media planning tool created by Missy Palacol and Kalisa Jenne-Fraser of Kalyx Group. You may remember their names as speakers at the 2019 Slow Flowers Summit in St. Paul. I’m so happy that Missy and Kalisa have updated their action plan for the entire month of April — and they have permitted me to share this resource with listeners of the Slow Flowers Podcast.

This is free to you! Please follow this link to downloaded Kalyx Group’s 30-day action plan. I’ll see you online — can’t wait to watch how you use their resources for your platform!

Okay, let’s jump right into my conversation with April Vomfell of Flathead Farmworks.

April is a fourth generation cool-climate gardener. She got her start at a young age, weeding the carrot bed and emptying the compost bucket. Since buying her first camera at age 9, she has been taking pictures of flowers and watching things grow.

Before college, April’s first full-time job was in a flower shop, helping customers and learning about flower care and handling. After receiving a bachelor’s in English, April worked as a copy editor and website editor for several years in Washington, New Mexico and Wyoming. She completed a master’s in library science and then worked in public libraries in Wyoming and Montana for several years before transitioning to jobs in marketing.

Now as a flower farmer, floral designer and entrepreneur, April combines all of her skills in marketing, organization, writing and planning with her passion for growing beautiful flowers.

April and her husband, Kurt, met in 2013 and discovered their mutual love of wilderness, Montana, good food and gardening.

In 2015 they founded Flathead Farmworks to provide fresh vegetables and herbs to local restaurants. As a landscape architect, Kurt is instrumental in the design and functionality of the Flathead Farmworks’ growing spaces. Located in downtown Kalispell, the couple’s half-acre urban farm contains their home, annual and perennial gardens, shade trees and fruit trees, chicken yards and a greenhouse.

It is a work in progress, with added improvements and new experiments every season. And ask you will hear, flowers have gradually become the main focus of their business. I’m so pleased you can join this conversation and hear more about it from April. Find and follow Flathead Farmworks at these social places:

Flathead Farmworks on Facebook

Flathead Farmworks on Instagram

Thanks so much for joining me today as we shared two important conversations with you. Connections and community are more important than ever before – and what we value as truly important and essential has radically changed in the course of just a few weeks.

It’s so easy to feel overwhelmed and I know I have felt that way for a few weeks, wondering how Slow Flowers can support our community. To that end, we launched our first Virtual Member Meet-Up on March 27th. Fifty of you, from more than 20 states, joined in on a Zoom platform where we could see each other on the screen of our desktop or mobile devices, and hear from one another. It was really powerful to see your faces and hear your voices. What a beautiful experience. As one flower farmer told me afterwards: “It actually does help to not feel so alone during this crisis.”

If you’re interested in joining the next Slow Flowers Virtual Meet-Up, follow this link and mark Fridays at 9 am Pacific/Noon Eastern for our weekly gathering. The next meeting is April 3rd – I hope to see you there. We will have a few special guests and we also have some fun giveaways you might win.

Another important topic to share with you are updated plans for the fourth annual Slow Flowers Summit, scheduled for June 28-30. I want to announce that May 15th is the date when we will make a definitive decision whether to move forward with the original conference dates or reschedule them.

We want to make sure you have 45 days’ notice to adjust your plans if we have to postpone. And just in case, mark October 26-27 as the backup dates for gathering together at our beautiful venue, Filoli Historic House and Garden in Woodside, California. As I said last week: I’m as eager as you are to experience a fabulous conference that’s presented in a safe environment. I hope this plan assures you and assists you in managing your own schedule moving forward into 2020.

You can contact us anytime with questions and I’ve added links to my email and that of our event manager Karen Thornton in today’s show notes.  You can also follow the Filoli VISIT Page and Slow Flowers Summit Page for additional updates.

Thank you to our sponsors

Thank you to Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. Read our stories at slowflowersjournal.com.

Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com.

Rooted Farmers. Our friends at Rooted Farmers work 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.

Syndicate Sales, an American manufacturer of vases and accessories for the professional florist. Look for the American Flag Icon to find Syndicate’s USA-made products and join the Syndicate Stars loyalty program at syndicatesales.com.

The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 592,000 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 the American cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Podcast. 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 Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:

Tiny Putty; Heartland Flyer; Gaena; Glass Beads
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

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More

Oh my gosh, Slow Flowers Podcast listeners, you are in for a wonderful treat today because my guest is one of my lifelong friends and dearest sister in all sorts of horticultural, floral and artistic adventures in this world. It is my deepest privilege to introduce you to artist and designer, writer, editor and educator Lorene Edwards Forkner.

Lorene is a columnist for the Seattle Times weekly gardening column called GROW, along with her colleague Colin McCrate of Seattle Urban Farm Co. She is author of five garden books, including The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening: Pacific Northwest, and Handmade Garden Projects, bestselling titles from Timber Press.

Lorene owned a popular and beloved boutique specialty nursery in Seattle for more than a decade, called Fremont Gardens; she has served on the boards of a number of horticultural organizations, has edited a horticulture journal and is the designer of two gold medal display gardens at the Northwest Flower and Garden Festival.

Most recently, Lorene’s creative life can be found on Instagram, where @gardenercook she is in the 2nd year creating and sharing a series called “Seeing Color in the Garden.”

She started this project on April 3, 2018 as part of #the100dayproject as #100DaysofSeeingColorintheGarden. She continued her series through the subsequent months and this past April 2019, kicked off #Another100 DaysofSeeingColorintheGarden, which concludes today, July 10th.

So our timing is perfect to sit down with Lorene and learn more about this visually engaging, spiritually uplifting creative project. I’m so happy that you are joining my chat with this highly intuitive observer of color in nature, in plants, in flowers and even in the kind of organic objects you might pick up on a walk and drop in your pocket.

When she kicked off #100 days of seeing color in the garden, Lorene wrote this:

“And so it begins. #the100dayproject is here and so am I—well, sort of. These days life is charged with loss and grief on many levels. But if I’m honest with myself (& desperately trying to keep on keeping on) I have to acknowledge that without great love and joy there would be nothing to lose, nothing to grieve. So however hard, this pain is a gift.

“#100daysofseeingcolorinthegarden will be my #dailypractice starting today. My hope is that this daily interval focused on seeing my beloved garden will provide refuge and a way forward. They say that time heals. I’m curious to watch that unfold. How cool would it be (WILL it be) to witness the process playing out in real time. A powerful anchor for future losses.

“So for 100 days I will be making time to see and interpret color in my garden. It’s basically permission to pause and play.

She continues, “. . . this idea had to be something simple, intuitive, and soothing. I like to say color is my native tongue, and I’d pretty much lost all other words.

“It’s now nearly 150 days later and while I’m not still counting, I am still painting. SeeingColorInTheGarden has become a daily practice, permission to step away from work, house, garden—even play. When I sit down at my table with my oh-so-humble watercolors, a brush, and blank sheets of watercolor paper the world goes calm.

“Occasionally I get asked “HOW.” I don’t know how else to describe it but seeing with all 5 senses… things go quiet, time stops, and everything is focused on the blossom, twig, rock, or the occasional snail. My paints are nothing special, but they’re familiar to me and I feel comfortable with the visual vocabulary I’ve developed with them. For all that this project has played out in public on Instagram, it still feels strange to write about something so intimate and deeply personal. Except that, along with my finding a measure of peace, I have also found a community of people who are also in pain, stressed, or simply in need of a little colorful refreshment. A chromal chord has been struck.

She concludes: “At the end of the day, the swatches and test strips are my secret sauce. A record of how I hunt and peck and forage for the right color. The paintings themselves without their subject are pretty flat and lifeless compared to the energy of painting + plant. But these little swatch strips please me to no end.”

Find and follow Lorene Edwards Forkner at these social places:

LEF on Facebook

LEF on Instagram

A Handmade Garden Blog. Sign up for Lorene’s newsletter here.

THANK YOU for joining me today as I indulged in an entirely inspiring conversation with a dear and personal friend. As Lorene Edwards Forkner and I discussed, she has agreed to come to the 4th Annual Slow Flowers Summit, which takes place June 29-30, 2020 in Santa Cruz, Calif. In fact, Lorene is the first featured presenter we’re announcing for 2020. I’ll have much more to share about her presentation at the Summit and about what you can expect to experience as the planning evolves.

For now, I urge you to find a set of watercolors and begin to emulate the daily or even weekly practice of looking at flowers, petals, pods, leaves, bark and other minute details from your own environment in a new way — to let the color palette of nature speak to all of your senses.

Our theme for 2019 – Fifty States of Slow Flowers – continues today with George Hart of Hart’s Garden & Nursery in Missoula, Montana.

I met George and Marcia Hart in September 2017 when they hosted a lovely gathering for Slow Flowers members in Western Montana. What a fabulous experience getting to see where they live and farm, and to connect with an incredible community of growers and floral designers who are bringing local flowers to Missoula and beyond.

Harts Garden and Nursery grows tulips, irises, peonies, delphinium, dahlias, chrysanthemums, liatrus, rudbeckia, zinnias, hellebores, lilies and several kinds of decorative grasses.

The Harts’ mission is to offer attractive, locally-grown flowers and bouquets to residents and businesses of Missoula and Western Montana. They offer several locally-grown varieties of lily bulbs for sale at area farmers’ markets, as well as perennials well-suited to Western Montana. I’m so pleased that George agreed to jump on the line with me this week to talk about what’s happening in this community, as well as give you a preview of an event on September 27th when I’ll return to Hart’s Garden — and you’re invited.

Here are the details:

MONTANA FLORISTS ASSOCIATION Annual Convention
Fri., Sept. 27, 7:15 p.m. Farm Tour & Dinner

HARTS GARDEN & NURSERY, Missoula, Montana

Debra Prinzing will join Slow Flowers members Harts Garden & Nursery as they host a local-flowers reception during the Montana Florists Association annual convention. The Slow Flowers members are invited to join us! As George Hart says: “$10 buys dinner and contacting me puts your name on the list. This is a chance for Montana flower farmers to learn and dine with fellow farmers and florists who care about local, Montana-grown blooms! For more information or to sign up, please contact George Hart atmghart@bresnan.net or call: 406-396-8245.

Thank you for taking the time to pop in the ear buds and join the Slow Flowers Podcast. Thank you to our entire community of flower farmers and floral designers who together define the Slow Flowers Movement. As our cause gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of the American cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.

THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS

Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. It’s the leading trade magazine in the floral industry and the only independent periodical for the retail, wholesale and supplier market. Take advantage of the special subscription offer for members of the Slow Flowers Community.

Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org. The upcoming regional conference takes place this weekend — Sunday, July 14 & Monday, July 15 — in Maine and is called “In the Thick of It.” The gathering features flower farm tours, networking with other growers, and bonus tours of Johnny’s Selected Seeds and the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens.

Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com and check out my past articles featuring the wisdom and voices of flower farmers.

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. Spring bulb season is almost here – my tulips are poking out of the ground already! Visit Longfield Gardens at longfield-gardens.com

The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 492,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much.

I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Podcast. 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 Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com. 

Music Credits:
Castor Wheel Pivot; Betty Dear; Gaenaby 
Blue Dot Sessions
http://www.sessions.bluehttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

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

In The Field
Music from: audionautix.com

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Podcast Index | RSS | More