During the last few weeks of my internship with GRuB, my interest has grown in flower bouquet production. At the beginning of Spring, on my first day, I separated dahlia tubers for replanting. Now at the end of the summer, those tubers that were planted in May are producing flowers. Along with dahlias, there are also gladiolas, sunflowers, zinnias, amaranth, calendula, yarrow, lavender, marigolds, hydrangeas, as well as an assortment of greenery and other flowers that the youth occasionally throw into the bouquets, even though they were not necessarily planted for that purpose.
GRuB makes flower bouquets for local Olympia businesses who sign up for the Bouquet CSA at the beginning of the season. During regular harvest time, a group of youth split off to make the bouquets. By the end of the summer, all of the youth will have had a chance to make bouquets. In total this season, there are 17 businesses who participate in the CSA.
The parts of the bouquets, as GRuB introduces them to youth are: green foliage, line flowers, statement flowers, and filler flowers.
Greens are placed into the vases first. Any leaves that potentially touch the vase water are stripped off the branches so they do not rot in the water. The greens will help support the other flowers and keep them in place. By crossing the branches in the water, there are spaces for the flower stems to fit and be supported.
Line flowers are the tallest flowers that go into the bouquet. This year, the only line flowers that we have at GRuB are gladiolas. Gladiolas have sturdy stems and we cut them long so they are taller than the other flowers in the vase. Line flowers draw the eye to the arrangement.
Statement flowers are large flowers such as dahlias and sunflowers. The width of the flower takes up a significant portion of room in the arrangement. Statement flowers have showy petals that have the most vibrant colors in the bouquets.
Filler flowers are smaller flowers such as yarrow, hydrangeas, and lavender that are put into the bouquets last to fill in space between statement and line flowers. These flowers match the color scheme of the rest of the bouquet, and like the greenery, they support the other larger line and statement flowers.