Flower making workshop schedule for June and July 2016

Here is the schedule for fabric and leather flower making workshops for the months of June and July 2016.
For more information, pictures and bookings please click here to visit our website

Trooping the colour ceremony and silk flowers

As you have probably heard, last Saturday Britain celebrated the Queen's official birthday with Trooping the Colour, a fabulous military parade.

Although the Queen was born on 21 April, it has long been the tradition to celebrate the Sovereign's birthday publicly on a day in the summer, when good weather is more likely. This military ceremony dates back to the early eighteenth century or earlier, when the colours (flags) of the battalion were carried (or 'trooped') down the ranks so that they could be seen and recognised by the soldiers.

Trooping the Colour is carried out by fully trained and operational troops, watched by members of the Royal Family, invited guests and members of the public. 

Naturally I was drawn to the celebration in order to observe what headwear members of the Royal family have chosen for the event.

A lot of attention has been drawn to the Duchess of Cambridge especially that it was her last  public appearance before the birth of her first child. In this nice picture we can see her pale pink Alexander McQueen coat and matching hat in more detail. 

Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall wore the Philip Treacy designed picture hat in a sparkly oyster coloured straw with a large upturned brim.

But most of all I was pleased when I saw the Duchess of Kent's hat. She wore a white pillbox hat trimmed with purple roses and a white tulle veil.

Interestingly the day before I painted one of my roses in a very similar colour.

For me silk flowers and hats is a marriage made in heaven and it is a pity we did not see many silk flowers on Royal hats at the parade. 

Here is one of my pillbox hats decorated with an open English rose:

Silk rose pillbox

Silk flower fascinators look equally stunning. Sometimes it takes just a flower to make a fascinator, like in this black rose fascinator

Black rose fascinator

or the oversized camellia headband

Oversized blush pink camellia hat

Do you use silk flowers to decorate your hats? If not, with what do you decorate them? Please share your opinions.

Bridal hat with a gorgeous silk rose and a birdcage veil

Please be kindly informed that we have moved! To read new blog posts, purchase our floral pieces and learn more about how to make flowers you are welcome to visit out new website.

When I finished assembling this rose I immediately thought of it as a millinery flower. Called Bride it is a gorgeous large silk rose of nearly 70 petals and is indeed meant for weddings.
I had the hat idea in my mind as well, I just needed some time to get hold of all the necessary supplies to start creating. And the supply list is rather extensive: sinamay base, viscose velvet, hat elastic, crin, coque feathers, dupioni leaves, birdcage veil with spots and of course the silk rose.
Here is  the picture of the finished hat:

And to give you an idea of how it looks on a head I acted as a model :-D in these pictures:

The bridal hat is available for purchase at at my store on Etsy

A bunch of dahlias

Please be kindly informed that we have moved! To read new blog posts, purchase our floral pieces and learn more about how to make flowers you are welcome to visit out new website.

Last week was a dahlia week. Sometimes that happens. Poppy week, peony week, some other flower week.  So I started off by making a realistic dahlia on a stem. And here is the picture of it 

I used pure silk satin for petals and pure silk cosmosatin for leaves and calyx.

Because I needed to make a flower as a gift to one of my friends, I thought it would be a good idea to make another dahlia but this time probably a fantasy one. As I have discovered lond time ago by making 2 flowers at a time it is possible to save  quite a lot of time so whenever possible I always try to make 2 similar flowers at the same time. So for one a light golden pure silk satin has been chosen (plus shantung  the colour of old gold  for leaves), and intense Royal blue pure silk satin for the other one (along with viscose velvet in black to light blue gradation of colour for leaves and calyx).
Here are the 2 fantasy dahlias which I came up with

The golden dahlia has been successfully posted to my friend in Russia. The blue one is actually available for purchase at my Etsy shop at the moment.
Do you think I was through with the dahlias at that moment? I thought so too :-)
But on Friday I got a like-snow-in-July birthday party invitation from my other friend. As you understand the gift HAD to be handmade! So, another dahlia! This time, though, with other variations on material. Again, pure silk satin for petals, in rich dark chocolate colour with hints of burgundy/ The leaves and calyx have been made of hand painted lace and doubled with thin Japanese lining silk.  I tried to paint them in rich brown and intense berry colours. Here is the forth dahlia

The gift has been presented and we should have some photo feedback soon :-)
This chocolate brown dahlia is available to order. Please contact me via my Facebook page or my website shop  if you would like one.
Or, maybe you want one inn a completely different colour? What would it be?

Fantasy poppy

Here is an experimental poppy in grey and turquoise hues. The petals are made of very thin printed habotai silk, the leaves are made of 2 layers of grey silk satin and for the little seedbox I have used some bright turquoise dupioni silk.

The fantasy poppy is finished with a brooch base.

Sweet peas

Today I would like you to meet probably the most iconic flower of  the English cottage garden: the sweet peas. They come in endless shades of  pink, red, violet, purple, in fact any shade between white and chocolate brown.

Sweet peas corsage is made of 3 types fabric (100% pure silk) and mounted on a brooch base.

Dust off your summer hats

Despite all that rain that has been pouring down on us for the last what? 4 weeks I have not stopped waiting for summer sunshine and warm days. Thinking of which it is time I dug out my summer wardrobe to see what needs some refreshing. As you might have guessed summer is THE season for silk flowers lovers as you can wear them every day and combine literally with anything from a smart dress to a white vest and jeans combination. Believe me, there is a flower for any outfit imaginable ☺

But for now I wanted to share some ideas of how one can decorate a summer hat with silk flowers. In my case it is a simple crushabale natural looking hat but straw hats would look even nicer!

One day I am planning to create a whole bunch of wild flowers to decorate my hat combining chamomiles, clover, wild poppies, blue cornflowers... I just need to find time :-)

One pattern two roses

Here is how the assembling process influences the final shape of a flower. I made these 2 roses using the same  pattern but they look quite different. The white rose is meda out of silk tafetta which I personally found a bit stiff to work with. The pink rose has got nicely coloured pastel leaves