This country is in the midst of a floral revolution. Perhaps you haven’t noticed, given other events, but over the past several years, flower arrangements have become wilder and stranger, incorporating all manner of seasonal flora plucked from the woods, the garden, the roadside and the vegetable patch. You are now more likely to see a bouquet laden with sheathes of grass, arching vines of clematis, Fritillaria bulbs and flowering purple basil than just a polite cluster of roses or calla lilies. Big deal, you think. Well, it is. Allow me to explain why.
On just the level of style, these arrangements — loose and fluid and highlighting the beauty of their individual elements — are a vast improvement over the less fortunate floral trends we’ve suffered through: Recall those fads such as stems held in bondage by swathes of foliage, or tight mounds in which the blossoms just barely scaled the edge of the vase, or Pop Art installations in which bright blooms were used for nothing more than Crayola-like graphic patterns. If you consider the materials those florists were working with, it’s analogous to chefs cooking only with canned fruit and out of season tomatoes. In the current floral industrial complex, everything we admire about a fresh flower — the fragrance, the delicate structure, the fleeting beauty and connection to season and place — is bred out so that the flower can be inexpensive, long lasting and easily shippable. Most of our cut flowers are imported from Latin America, where labor is cheap, working conditions harsh, regulations lax and chemicals prevalent — and that’s just the growing part. Then, after being jacked up on fungicide, dunked in vats of preservatives and jostled and manhandled for about a week, these odorless, uniform, sturdy flowers with their enormous carbon footprint come to rest in our florist’s hands or in our homes. Nice.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: New York Times
