This week I wanted to create a quick versatile design using Gerberas. I bought my flowers at Springtime Nurseries, Crews Hill near Enfield, North London. This garden centre has a refrigerated room full of quality and affordable flowers and foliage as well as some floristry equipment and accessories. It is worth a visit if you want to find something different or if you need to buy a bigger quantity for an event or party, and unlike the wholesalers it is open to the public.
I wanted to create a natural prairie look so added some grass from the garden to add movement. You could alternatively add some dried accessories, in this photo I have used the bizarrely named “ting ting”, which comes in numerous colours – you can sometimes find it or similar dried accessories in Wilkinson’s or other household shops.
You can display these vases in numerous ways, in a line down the centre of a table, on a windowsill, mantlepiece or clustered together in a group.
How to Create
Find a group of vases, bottles or other containers and make sure they are clean – Gerbera are sensitive to bacteria more on this below.
Cut at various heights on the diagonal each Gerbera stem, cutting some just above the rim of the vase. I put 2 in each vase but there aren’t any rules. Cut your grasses or dried accessory, add to the vases. Dilute flower food and add to each vase, not too deep. Arrange the vases to suit your home or occasion.
Gerberas – how to look after them
These daisy like flowers come in a wide range of vibrant colours, also available as Germini – mini Gerberas. They do have a tendancy to wilt with a “bent neck”- to avoid this,
Look at the stems not just the flowers when you are buying them, check they look strong and undamaged.
Make sure your vases are clean, after using vases wash with warm water and very diluted bleach. Keep your scissors clean, put them in the dishwasher occasionally.
Use flower food if possible, it contains anti-bacterial agents. Don’t make the water too deep, but keep the level topped up.
As with all flowers they will last longer if kept out of direct sunlight, in a cool room away from fruit (which release ethylene which speeds decay)
Wiring Gerberas
If you buy your flowers from a florist they may offer to wire the Gerberas for you. This is to support and strengthen the stem to help prevent the “bent neck” problem Gerberas are prone to. I would say this is worthwhile if you want to display the flowers with long stems or use them in a floral arrangement which needs precise placement of the flowers, but outside of this should not be necessary for a more casual design.
flowerclippings 