There is, arguably, never a bad time to send flowers. But in a year marked by both isolation and turmoil, a delivery of blooms, a gift that also helps support financially hard-hit small businesses, feels especially poignant. And so for the first in our new series of Black Book guides, we’ve created a directory of the most imaginative and masterful florists working today in six major cities. These 22 designers make arrangements that are often wildly different in style, ranging from understated bouquets to experimental showpieces, and we’ve tried to offer a range of “classic,” “earthy” and “unusual” options in each place. But if these florists’ aesthetics are diverse — informed by everything from old master paintings to modern dance — they all bring a singular vision to the centuries-old art they practice. Many are also united in rejecting the methods of the contemporary globalized flower trade, in which blooms are cut sometimes months before they’re sold, sprayed with toxic preservatives and then shipped great distances at great environmental cost. Some are instead championing local growers and avoiding harmful substances like flower foam, while others are even cultivating their own flowers or privileging historically overlooked materials such as seedpods, roots and weeds. At the bottom of this article you’ll find a downloadable guide with delivery information that we hope will serve as a useful, and much turned to, resource.

Source Article