Our Unique Approach to Eco-Floristry
Transparency in the floral design process reveals that not all florists or farmer florists operate with the same values. At Flora, we are making decisions that are not just “eco” because it’s trendy to say so, but our decisions are ecologically-minded because we really care to keep our water, soil, and air clean and healthy for future generations. To that end, we have made some pointed decisions about flower sourcing, sharing equipment, avoiding standard floral products, and reducing trash. We believe that these decisions significantly impact the integrity of our designs, both in ethos and quality. Here is what makes our approach unique:
100% Southern Oregon Organically-Grown Flowers. That’s right, it’s not just an undisclosed portion of our floral designs that are local and organic, it’s 100% of them. All of the flowers that we design with are grown using organic practices and 98% of them come from Flora Farm. Occasionally we purchase flowers from other organic flower farmers in the Applegate or Rogue Valleys to augment our offerings to wedding clients, but those flowers are always grown within 50-70 miles (that’s Local!) of an event. We absolutely never use imported flowers because imports have a huge carbon footprint, are often grown in countries where more toxic chemicals are allowed in agricultural production than allowed in the US, are often grown by workers receiving a much lower wage, and are treated upon arrival to the US border with more chemicals!
No Floral Foam. Floral foam is a standard in the floristry business but it typically contains formaldehyde and decomposes into micro-plastics that are polluting our oceans and soils. So, we do not use it in our floral designs. When traditional florists turn to foam for arbor designs and providing mechanics to hold flowers in vases, we get creative with chicken wire and floral wire or we choose vases and botanicals that don’t rely on floral foam for their success.
No Bleaches and Dyes. Floristry has fashion trends and right now the boho look of faded grasses has many florists buying bleached botanicals. Also, it’s very common for florist to purchased dyed plants to get just the right color and to paint or gloss plants and vases. Bleaches, dyes, and paints pollute soil and water and the aerosol in cans that paint and gloss come in contribute to air pollution. At Flora, we utilize sun bleached botanicals and recommend color palettes to our clients that are achievable with what we can grow seasonally and organically.
No Chemical Floral Preservatives. It is standard for flower farmers and florist to use chemical preservatives to make flowers last longer. They have names like “holding solutions”, “hydrating solutions”, and “plant food”. At Flora, we find that we can achieve consistently good vase life for our flowers by harvesting at the right time of day and at the right point in the plant’s life cycle, by using good sanitation habits with our equipment, and by keeping our flowers cool post-harvest. The problem with using these solutions is that they or the water that they are added to get poured out somewhere, and those liquids either pollute soil or our water. Even if one is on a city sewer system and the waste stream is out of sight, those liquids eventually end up impacting our oceans, rivers, coasts and farmlands.
Composting all organic waste. All of the stems, leaves, roots and branches that get trimmed off in the design process get composted right at Flora Farm. That compost is then later utilized to improve the soil on the farm.
Re-using Floristry Equipment. We try to reduce the quantity of new vases, transport crates, and other equipment that is purchased for events. Clients can borrow our equipment instead of buying new and we charge a refundable deposit fee that gets returned to clients when equipment is returned in good order. This is not a rental service; we actually don’t charge for use of this equipment. We re-use chicken wire, floral frogs, pins, wire and just about anything else that can be re-purposed and we encourage clients to return these items to us after their events instead of throwing them away. Local retailers give us their used floral buckets and we haven’t had to purchase new buckets as a result for several years. We purchase re-usable zip ties for doing large scale floral installations and re-use them afterwards.
Re-using Packaging. When we have to buy in new equipment (like vases) we save all packaging from these purchases and re-use it for shipping our fresh and dried flowers. Also, customers can return their Kraft paper floral sleeves to us and we re-use it to pack shipping boxes as well.
Brown Paper Sleeves. There are mountains of waste created by plastic floral sleeves. These single-use plastics are piling up throughout our world. At Flora, we slip our flower bunches and bouquets into Kraft paper (which has a high recycled content) sleeves instead. We collect used sleeves from customers and recycle them for packaging shipments and starting fires in the winter.
Recycling. All cardboard, glass, metal wire and plastic containers that can be recycled in Oregon are recycled by Flora.
***As you are making choices about how to spend your money on flowers, we encourage you to ask farmers and florists the hard questions about where they are getting their flowers and how they are working to minimize waste created by their businesses.