Ashton Hayes & Tarvin Flower club

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From Tarvin and Ashton Hayes flower club ....

Report of the Tarvin and Ashton Hayes flower club April meeting.

Mark Entwistle from Sandbach was our demonstrator this month. He describes himself as "The Floral Enthusiast" and that sums him up well.

After our demonstration I spoke to Mark and told him it would be difficult to put into words just how brilliant the evening had been. I said WOW, WOW and more WOW. He seemed to like that description. In fact it was not only wow six times for each design but after he finished he then made four tied bunches from his designs for the raffle which also looked fantastic.

His flowers were 1st class quality and also exotic. He liked bright colours and contrasts. Although he admitted that he liked white the best. He saved the white until last when he produced a large design in a white container. This was the only design in which he used floral foam. He grouped his foliage which contained lighter shades of green and then added a huge cymbidium orchid along with large headed chrysanthemums, green anthuriums and small white orchids. He had also taken some of the bottom orchids from the huge one and put then into small holders which held water to place among his design.

He had made structures for several designs so that the flowers could be in water. The first was a midilino and wood strip construction sprayed in purple and orange. Small containers for water were within the construction and he chose orange gerbera, purple orchids and a flower very like bird of paradise. All of these had long stems for the raffle later. Another smaller construction covered a bowl, and all was sprayed gold. Into chicken wire he designed a traditional arrangement in a fan shape. Within this design he used clematis which the Dutch growers are producing in Africa as this gives a lower carbon footprint than growing in hothouses in Holland.

Design 3 was very dramatic. A wooden trough contained a row of cylinder vases which had red dogwood, ginger flowers, red anthuriums, deep red gerbera, pink anthuriums and purple gerbera. Finally, red dyed cane was woven across the design.

Mark does weddings and corporate work, so he showed us a large design suitable for this type of work. A large aluminium triangle with silver tangled wire near the apex was used to display purple alliums and deep purple orchids along with a little foliage. The effect was stunning. A hand tied bunch with beautiful roses and gerbera in a palm collar came next before his final white design.

Everyone there felt that this was the best demonstration they had ever seen. He was so very talented and explained all he did and why. A memorable evening.

Our meeting in May is on the 8th at 7-30pm in The Edna Rose room. Visitors are welcome to join us.