As many of you know I am about to release a flower design training schedule. Because I want to provide classes to many different types of designers I would love to have your feedback. I also want to be a part of agricultural tourism so my hope is that I can include some of my favorite Loudoun County vineyards, antique stores, flower farms, photographers, and bed and breakfasts in on the fun. Mind you, these are just ideas running around in my head and nothing has been confirmed but here is what I am thinking…
- We will call this possibly, “Design Time In The Garden” but I would love to hear your suggestions on a fun name.
This class will offer basic design training and also garden cutting, this will be our least expensive class and we will cut from my personal gardens. Once we have gathered our flowers we will hit the flower shop for design time. These would be simple classes of a 2 hour nature, we will talk basics and cut from the garden. Students will take home their garden designs. $105.00
- Lunch & Learn or Dinner & Design
These classes will offer more elaborate design training and I will provide some of my favorite flowers from abroad. We will also provide lunch or dinner for this event. $325.00, with financial aid available for Norwegian’s via Sambla’s refinansiering website. This is a four hour session and at least one hour will go to the dinning experience. We will complete the dinning table with the designs we have created and enjoy a lovely meal together.
- A day of design
Students will come for the day, a light snack will be offered upon arrival and then we will head to a local antique store to gather unique and fun containers. There are several really amazing antique stores near our studio. While shopping guests can purchase a new container to design in, or they can bring one of their favorites from home. Guests would also be allowed to pull a vase from our inventory if they prefer. We will then go to visit Don’s Dahlias for a cutting session. ( Shhhh….Don, doesn’t know we are coming yet) We will return to the studio for design time and a afternoon lunch or dinner. We will discuss the basics of floral design and create a design for students to take home. This class will be from 9 to 4pm, and the cost is $450.00
- Wedding Designer Training
This course will be offered at the price $1,500 for a two day session. We will discuss how I started my business, slow growth, social media, technique, sources, quality, vendor relationships and photography. Lunch will be provided both days. We will design bridal bouquets, bouts, corsages, centerpieces, and we will work on a few big designs.
- The Full Bouquet, This will be a wedding designers retreat
We will stay at the incredibly lovely …( I will be choosing a local bed and breakfast for this event and I already have my eyes on someone very special) breakfast and lunch will be provided as well as 3 full days of training. This is a comprehensive class that includes trips to local antique stores, vineyards, local growers, Holly’s house, lots of design time and a photo shoot that will end in a amazing barn or unique setting. A photographer will also shoot the designs to help build the portfolio of the student. $3,000.
The kids and chaos are free and a part of the experience.
So tell me what you think, I am waiting for your feedback.
They all sound amazing! Just wish I lived several thousand k’s closer so I could attend them all! Would love something like this in Australia!
Come on over and then I will come to your place in Australia. I would love to have you!!!
Oh Holly… what a dream come true to be able to attend your classes….this KY girl is saving her dollars to take as many classes as I can!!
I am so excited to read your idea of classes. I own a flower shop in Wilmington, DE and would really be interested in coming to your classes. I thoroughly enjoy your website, and catch up on your blog a couple times a week. You do have a a wonderful style and your brides are very lucky to have you. If you are ever in the Delaware/Philadelphia area, please let me know, I would love to take you to lunch. Have another blooming day!!!! barb
I’m so excited to read this post! Sign me up for all of them please 🙂 Seriously, they all sound fantastic.
As a newcomer, I’m most interested in the Wedding Designer Training. I do love the idea of cutting from my own garden, so that’d be next. The retreat sounds awesome but that may prove to be a logistical challenge for me at least.
Would the Wedding Designer and retreat be the same content or is the Wedding Designer Training class meant to be taken before the retreat as that will go over more advanced techniques?
Amanda,
I am so glad you are excited. In the wedding designer training classes, I am going to focus exclusively on how I started the business and how and why our business works. The retreat will also offer a good bit of that training but it will also have some vacation aspects as well as offer the portfolio building opportunity. I am still working out all of the details but I am excited as well.
So excited, I read your posts each day, I feel inspired and particularly love the posts about the garden and your family. I have been researching workshops in the US as I am from Australia and hope to do several on the one trip. Yours is now firmly penciled at the top of my list!! Can’t wait to meet you and wander through your garden xx Have a gorgeous day!
So so so excited for you, Holly! I can’t wait to come take a class! I love your fresh ideas and the energy and passion that you bring to everything you do. 🙂
Oh my goodness… the wedding designer training sounds fantastic! It would be such a treat to see how your beautiful designs are made. This is such an exciting new direction for your company!
any more details, decided? you have some folks, very excited. do you actually have a space in your crazy schedule. or is that the details still being looked at?
We have the physical space but you guessed correctly finding the time to schedule this is the big issue but we are working on that now because we are going to start this year. Next year we will build it into our schedule. We want this!!!
I would love to take any and all of these classes! I especially like that you are offering different price points. I hope I will be able to take at least one of them, but I bet they fill up quickly.
I have been scouring the Internet searching for classes just like the Wedding Designer Training and Retreat!! I am just getting started but the more I do, the more I want to keep doing it!! and the more I want to learn better techniques and design principles, etc. Thank you for deciding to make these classes a priority. I would love any information as it becomes available. Your work is such an inspiration to me. Thank you!!!!
Holly, I am so grateful for your inspiring work and the transparent and honest voice you give us as you go through this process yourself. I am a recent college grad, living back in my Dad’s house and working in a restaurant, and, somehow, I keep finding my way out into his garden after work to gather flowers and put arrangements together. I have all of a sudden become consumed and entranced by flower design and it is changing my life! Never before did I think of myself as a creative person, but I tell you, I am creating something almost every day! I don’t know how it happened but I’m loving it and your blog is helping me realize how meaningful creative acts are for a healthy heart 🙂 I am headed to the east coast in late September and hope hope hope I can make it down to DC to see your studio. Do you think the “Design Time in the Garden” classes will be up and running by then?
Please email me and let me know when you are coming, I will try and get something together by then. Thank you for you kind words, I am so glad the garden is bringing you joy!!!
Well as your official flower stalker begging you to teach, I think this is a wonderful idea! I would love the wedding design training. My only concern is limiting. The amount of students. For novices like me who have no training at all but a deep desire to learn, I would want to walk away feeling like I got quality one on one time with you and a small group of other students for the price point. Once you have a schedule of classes please let me know! You know I’m a HUGE fan of your work. One of the topics I would love to learn about is how to acquire the flowers. It seems like you have some you have flown in and a great deal of gorgeous flowers you ar able to get from your garden. For those without those resources I would love to learn how to obtain flowers to practice with. Just an idea. Thanks Heidi! Can’t wait!!
Possible name for Design in the Garden: Flowers~En Plein Air Design
Holly, I am wake at close to 2am in the morning and I can’t sleep wondering how I can get my floral design business up and running. I’m just getting started and I am a HUGE fan of your work and your style. You seem so warm, honest and down to earth even with all the success you have had. For you to set aside time to teach is a blessing. You are such an inspiration and to have an opportunity to learn from you – well, I am there! I am very anxious to absorb all I can from you. I am very interested in the A Day of Design and Wedding Designer Training and Retreat – please keep me posted. : )
These all sound amazing. I’d fly in from Minnesota for one of the longer-term sessions. Though I am not a full-time florist, I would definitely benefit from your expertise and skills.