Category: Flowers - HOUSE OF THOL

Expeditie Honig coming up! Will we see you there?

20/4/2018

Honig complex: Nijmegen creative hotspot near the Waal

Since 2014 Nijmegen has a new creative Hotspot, just outside the city centre, close to the river: the Honigcomplex.

The former industrial factory is brought back to live by an array of creative entrepreneurs, ranging from trampoline-halls and artisan burger joints to hipster bike-shops and workshops for all kinds of designers and makers.
Oh, and there's a chocolate bar and a micro-brewery and a gallery and plenty of other creative businesses that i'm forgetting about now.

Once a year the entire complex opens its doors: the brewery presenting their latest beer, the designers showcasing the way they work and bars and artisan icecream-shops welcoming all visitors with specials and the best snacks.

The Honig Complex also houses C-More Conceptstore.
In their large industrial showroom, C-More offers a stylish collection of design from independent labels and design studio's from the Netherlands and beyond.

We're very happy to be part of the C-More collection, and this Sunday we'll be there demonstrating our Flower Constellations as part of Expeditie Honig.

Will we see you there?

EXPEDITIE HONIG
Honig Complex

Sunday April 22nd,
12:00 - 17:00

Waalbandijk 20-22
6541 AJ Nijmegen - NL

We're in Milan!! Or at least, the Flower Constellations are...

18/4/2018

Cartoni Design @ Masterly / The Dutch in Milan - Photograph by Ilco Kemmere

Salone del mobile, place to be

Every year in April, pretty much the complete Dutch Design Community packs up and moves their newest designs to Milan for the International Furniture Fair.

The actual Salone has a fair amount of Dutch Design, but the 'Fuori Salone', or 'outside the fair' programme, has pretty much been taken over by the Dutch in the last decade.

Cartoni Design @ Masterly

With our International Crowdfunding campaign running on Kickstarter, a presence in Milan would definitely help our cause.

Luckily, one of our friends in designerland, Wisse Trooster, could use a little floral touch in the style room he created for Dutch sustainable label Cartoni Design.
We were -of course- more than happy to lend Wisse a few Flower Constellation prototypes.

Flower Constellations in Milan @ Cartoni design / photograph by Wisse Trooster

Flower Constellations in Milan @ Cartoni design // photograph by Wisse Trooster

About Cartoni Design

Cartoni Design creates unique furniture collections from reclaimed, recycled and sustainable materials, working with different young Dutch Designers like, amongst others, Wisse Trooster.

It's a win/win: Cartoni Design brightens up their lovely exhibition with a stylish tool for a floral touch, and we're very happy with a little extra international exposure for our Flower Constellations.

If you're in Milan, make sure to visit the Cartoni Design Style room at Masterly and get a glimpse of our Flower Constellations in real life.

Here's where you should go

Masterly / The Dutch in Milan
Palazzo Francesco Turati
Via Meravigli 7, Milano

more information on Fuori-salone site (+map)

Want to stay updated about Cartoni Design?
Best thing to do is follow their Instagram account, or, for your daily dose of design inspiration, follow Wisse Trooster on Instagram.

Grazie mille, Wisse Trooster & Cartoni Design!

Flower Constellations on Kickstarter - pre-order now!

"Make a statement" - lovely post by Lossebloemen.nl

11/4/2018

When we first showed a little sneak peak of our Flower Constellations on Instagram a few weeks ago, the design immediately caught the eye of Lossebloemen.nl, a Dutch blog dedicated to celibrating the beauty of (single) flowers

We got in touch about our project and ended up prominently featuring a quote of blogger Chelan in our Flower Constellations project description.
Turned out she had been following us already, and has been a happy owner of a Waterworks-set for a while.

Chelan wrote a lovely piece about the Flower Constellations that's definitely worth checking out..
Read the full (Dutch) blogpost here.

The stretch goal shimmering on the horizon

9/4/2018

Now that we've reached our Kickstarter goal in only 11 days (yeeaah!), we are not slowing down with our compaign.
No sir! No way!

Of course we took the time to sip on a glass of bubbles (or three), but now that we've made it this far, we're upping our ante:
Let's go for stretch goals!

And the first stretch goal shimmering on the horizon is...

The propagation Constellation

If we get to €8.000,- in funding, we'll be getting serious about the Propagation constellation:

a brass tool similar to the Flower Constellations that is perfect for sprouting larger seeds and pits and for the propagation of cuttings.

This tool is actually what the story started with a few years ago, so its development would mean we're going full circle.
Talking about circles: the Propagation Constellation will be based on the arrangement of the planets in our solar system. Making it a functional tool as well as a helpful reminder of our place in the universe.

Help us get there

Good to know, as soon as we've developed it, we'll prepare a Propagation Constellation prototype and add it as a Reward possibility for you to pre-order.

So if you haven't pledged already, do so now and unlock a new universe of possibilities.

Flower Constellations fully funded in 11 days! Thank you all!

7/4/2018

A quiet Saturday night turned Weeeeehaaa!

Saturday evening we were enjoying a little peace and quiet, when all of a sudden, there it was:
The pledge.
That one more pledge we needed to reach our crowdfunding target.

Screams were heard, cups of tea were abandoned in favour of something bubbly, and we pretty much spent the entire rest of the evening texting friends.
One day later, it's time for a proper response to successfully reaching our goal this early on in the campaign.

Thank you all!

First of all: we want to thank each and everyone of you for helping us along, either by pledging or sharing our story.

Thank you!
We would've been nowhere without your help.

The next level

This is only the beginning: The crowdfunding campaign runs until Saturday May 5th, 21:00 CET, so still a while to go.

We're determined to take this success to the next level and create a worldwide audience for the Flower Constellations.
Are you on board?

Stretch goals & surprises

We have a few stretch goals lined up that we'd love to meet, and have a new professional reward tier in preparation especially for shops who want to be first to sell the Flower Constellations.
Also, we have a little thank you surprise in store for you that we'll tell you all about soon.

Now, since its a sunny Sunday, we'll get back to entertaining the kids and watering the wildflowers.
We'll be back behind our desks tomorrow, getting into details about our big plans and next steps.

Again: Thank you so much for your help so far.
Let's make this big together!

Fold Away - our free printable gift voucher is here

6/4/2018

Here it is: the Flower Constellations Gift Voucher.

The Flower Constellations will make a lovely gift once they're out in the shops.

But why wait so long?
Many friends and supporters pre-ordering the Flower Constellations on Kickstarter, reached out to us to ask for gift vouchers.

Well... You ask? We deliver.

With voucher requests coming in from all over the world, we had to create something that would be easy to print anywhere.

We challenged ourselves to create something that would exceed a flat printed leaflet.
It took quite some testing, folding, redesigning and puzzle-solving, but here it is: the official Flower Constellations Gift Voucher.

Free printable Flower Constellation gift voucher - fold away! / By House of Thol

Room for a little added natural sparkle

The A4 free download can be printed at any home-printer (do NOT scale to fit) and folded into a little envelope with hardly any white sheet left in sight.

Aside from fitting a little personal note, the small pouch is perfect for a package of wildflowerseeds.
In case you'd like to add a little natural sparkle to your gift.

We used the space underneath the fold of the envelope for a little explanation about the Flower Constellations and crowdfunding process, as well as our website address for more information.

The folding pattern should be pretty straightforward, provided you pay attention to the print on the sheet.

A little help in the folding department

Here's a short video showing you the steps to create the Flower Constellations Gift Voucher Envelope.

How to download the voucher, you ask?
Simply click the large image and a pdf will open in a new window.

Have fun folding and gifting!

These will be printed soon. A lot of them.

3/4/2018

Flower Constellations | effortless flower arrangements, inspired by the stars // Flyer // House of Thol

Flower Constellations | effortless flower arrangements, inspired by the stars // Flyer // House of Thol

So many flower constellation flyers

Have you ever ordered flyers?
And? Did they lure you into ordering the next batch up?
You know: 2500 instead of 1000 because 'the difference is only €25,-' and 'i don't want to risk running out of flyers'?

Well, we just did exactly that: we just ordered 2500 Flower Constellation flyers instead of a 1000.
On Eco paper, mind you. So still bad, yet a tiny bit less bad.
Now what we need to do, is get these babies distributed....

Where should we drop some off?

To try to avoid wasting resources: let's make certain all flyers find a spot where they can live up to their potential.

Do you know of nice bars, restaurants, coffeeplaces, (flower) shops, concept stores and/or other semi-public area's in your neighbourhood that attract a nice crowd and are ok with flyers being distributed?

Please let us know and we'll try and get our flyers in their coat room / waiting area / powder room and/or on their counter as swiftly as we can.
We'll be grateful till eternity. Or at least till May 5th.

The Kickstarter thing - how to work it (ook in het Nederlands!)

1/4/2018

What is Kickstarter?

Kickstarter is an online platform offering the opportunity to finance creative projects by collecting small contributions from a large group of people: Crowdfunding.

At Kickstarter it's possible to pre-order the Flower Constellations. When enough people do that and we reach our goal amount by the end of our campaign, we can start up production. You'll receive your pre-ordered Flower Constellation in August.

Since we've had a few questions from people about how to pledge, here's a blogpost about it.
And since many of those questions were directed at us from our Dutch network, for this one time, we'll make a bilingual blogpost.

Short summary

1. Find Flower Constellations on Kickstarter.
2. Choose how many Flower Constellations you want to pre-order and where they need to be shipped. (on the right side below 'pledge')
3. Fill out creditcard information.
4. Pre-order
5. You'll get to choose your type of Constellations once the campaign has successfully ended.
6. If we don't reach our goal, no charge will be made to your creditcard.

Wat is Kickstarter?

Kickstarter is een online platform dat het mogelijk maakt creatieve projecten te financieren door het verzamelen van kleine bijdrages van een grote groep mensen: Crowdfunding.

Op Kickstarter is het mogelijk de Flower Constellations vooruit bestellen. Als genoeg mensen dat doen en we ons doelbedrag halen, kunnen we de productie in gang zetten. We leveren de Flower Constellations dan in augustus.

Aangezien we nogal wat vragen kregen over hoe je kunt meedoen aan onze crowdfunding actie, bij deze een blogpost.
En vanwege de vele vragen uit ons Nederlandse netwerk, doen we m voor 1 keer in twee talen.

Kleine samenvatting

1. Vind Flower Constellations op Kickstarter.
2. Kies de hoeveelheid Flower Constellations die je vooruit wilt bestellen en waar ze heen moeten. (rechts onder het kopje pledge)
3. Vul je creditcard informatie in.
4. Bestel vooruit
5. Je krijgt de kans je sterrenbeeld te kiezen na afloop van de (succesvolle) campagne.
6. Als we ons doel niet halen, wordt er niets van je creditcard afgeschreven.

Getting to the right project

Simply browsing through Kickstarter, you probably won't come across the Flower Constellations like that. Not even with our 'Project we Love' batch, sadly.

Your fastest way to get there is to use the link that we pasted all over our website.

Like here:

Bij het goede project terecht komen

Gewoon maar door Kickstarter 'bladerend', zul je niet zo snel op de Flower Constellations stuiten, niet eens met onze 'Project we Love' batch, helaas.

De snelste manier om op de goede plek te komen is door de link te gebruiken die we op de website delen.

Zoals hier:

Pre-order the Flower Constellations now on Kickstarter / Effortless Flower Arrangements, inspired by the stars - by House of Thol

Once you're there

If you see the screen below, you're at the right place: congratulations, you've made it!

Take your time scrolling through our project page and watching our video, before turning your attention to the right side of the page and have a look at our rewards.

Als je er bent

Als je het scherm hieronder ziet dan zit je goed: Gefeliciteerd, je bent er!

Neem de tijd om door de projectpagina te scrollen en onze video te bekijken voor je je aandacht verlegt naar de rechterkant van de pagina om de reward-mogelijkheden te bekijken.

the ordering process

Choose your reward

On the right side of the page you can find the different possible options you can order the Flower Constellations: 'Rewards'.

Browse through the reward possibilities and choose your tier by clicking on it.

Kies je aanbieding

Aan de rechterkant van de pagina, staan de verschillende mogelijkheden waarop je de Flower Constellations kunt bestellen: 'rewards'.

Scroll door de mogelijkheden en kies door erop te klikken.

! Creditcard only !

There is no way around it.
Kickstarter only accepts payments by creditcard (for now). Such a shame for the Dutch market.

!Alleen met creditcard!

Helaas. Het kan echt niet anders.
Kickstarter accepteert, (nu nog) alleen betalingen met creditcard. Jammer hoor.

Select your country

As soon as you've chosen your reward tier, you'll be asked to choose your shipping country.
This will automatically add the required shipping costs to your pledge.

Click 'Continue'.

Kies je land

Zodra je je reward hebt gekozen, wordt je gevraagd het land waarnaartoe verzonden moet worden in te vullen. De verzendkosten worden nu automatisch toegevoegd aan het donatiebedrag.

Klik 'Continue'.

Log in / E-mail

On the next page you're asked to either log in or continue as a guest.
In the latter case you'll only have to fill in your e-mail address to start with.

Log in / E-mail

Op de volgende pagina wordt je gevraagd in te loggen of als gast door te gaan.
In het laatste geval hoef je op dit moment alleen je e-mail adres in te vullen.

creditcard information

Subsequently, you'll be asked to fill out your creditcard information.
(yes, creditcard is the only payment option)

creditcard gegevens

Vervolgens wordt je gevraagd je creditcard gegevens in te vullen.
(ja, het kan dus echt alleen met creditcard)

and... Pledge

Click 'pledge' and you'll be taken to the next step to finish.
Since we're not allowed to back our own project, this is as far as we can accompany you.
After your pledge, you'll receive an automated confirmation e-mail.

Thank you!

en... Pledge

Klik 'pledge' en je wordt naar de afrondende stap geleid. Aangezien wij ons eigen project niet mogen ondersteunen, is dit hoe ver we je kunnen begeleiden.
Na je pledge ontvang je een geautomatiseerde bevestigings e-mail.

Dank je wel!

Getting the starsign right

Wait?! But I didn't get to choose my starsign yet!
We know.
Once our Kickstarter campaign has successfully ended, we'll send you a survey to collect your preference.

By the way, here's an overview (click).

Het goede sterrenbeeld

Wacht!? Maar ik heb mijn sterrenbeeld nog niet gekozen! Dat weten we.
Zodra onze Kickstarter campagne geslaagd is, sturen we je een vragenlijst waarin je kunt aangeven wat je voorkeur heeft.

Hier is trouwens een overzicht (klik).

When you'll receive your Flower Constellation

If all goes well, we'll start producing the Flower Constellations once we've received the pledged money from Kickstarter, which will be around May 15th or so.

Leaving a little room for delays and set-backs, we expect to ship the Flower Constellations this August.

We'll keep you in the loop of our production process with regular updates.

Wanneer je je Flower Constellation krijgt

Als alles goed gaat, beginnen we met de productie van de Flower Constellations zodra we het ingelegde geld van Kickstarter hebben ontvangen, waarschijnlijk rond half mei.

Rekening houdend met mogelijke tegenvallers en vertraging, verwachten we de Flower Constellations in Augustus te kunnen versturen.
We houden je op de hoogte van ons productieproces met regelmatige updates.

Any questions left?

If anything is not clear, we didn't explain things properly, or you simply have something to ask, don't hesitate: get in touch and we'll get back to you as soon as possible.

Heb je nog vragen?

Als iets onduidelijk is, we iets niet goed hebben uitgelegd, of als je simpelweg iets te vragen hebt, aarzel niet, maar neem contact op, en we reageren zo snel mogelijk.

Thank you a zillion! // Super bedankt!

Flower Constellations - the story so far

30/3/2018

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars - pre-order now on Kickstarter

a personal note - the journey so far

Three days into our campaign and i'm finally finding the time to tell you a bit more about our Flower Constellations and their back story.

I'll be posting other updates about aspects of our design and production-process in the future, but for now, let me tell you a bit about the journey preceding our Flower Constellations crowdfunding campaign.

Flower Constellations -timeline- / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars - pre-order now on Kickstarter

the waterworks experience

After designing and successfully crowdfunding Waterworks, bringing our natural watering system to market turned out to be less straightforward than we had hoped.

We learned a great deal about running a business that first year and started to craft a strategy about the way we would develop House of Thol further.

Working best while coming up with solutions in our own living environment, we focus on keeping our designs close to ourselves.
We aim to create durable products that add value to our daily lives and help us maintain a green lifestyle.

Four years on, we have established a worldwide network of supporters and shops, and have sold almost 5000 Waterworks-sets.

We are ready for a new green product to add to our House of Thol collection.

Waterworks / Natural watering system for houseplants / order now on www.shophouseofthol.nl - design by House of Thol / photograph by Masha Bakker photography

House of Thol - Durable products for a green everyday / Thomas & Jana in the workshop - photograph by Masha Bakker photography

Crafting the constellations

Two years ago, we designed a little metal frame that would easily hold your avocado-pits in a glass of water: the pit-frame.
We designed it to be flat-pack and fit a variety of jars and glasses.

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars <the road to...> - pre-order now on Kickstarter

A large Dutch Garden center opted to produce it, but ran into management-issues and production stalled.
Last year we took matters back into our own hands and developed the Flower Constellations: based on the same flat-pack multi-fit principle, but for flowers and with an improved design.

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars <the road to...> - pre-order now on Kickstarter

We aimed to create a durable tool that would not only be functional, but would be lovely to gift as well.

While researching random patterns, we ran into the constellations.

A perfect fit, not because we're into astrology that much, but because we love that millenia ago, people tried to make sense of the skies and created the constellations as some kind of memory aid.
Telling each other stories so their order of things would not be forgotten.

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars <the road to...> - pre-order now on Kickstarter

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars <the road to...> - pre-order now on Kickstarter

the next step

After a year of designing, testing, tweaking, modeling and prototyping, our Flower Constellations are all set for production.

We have a reliable production partner lined up, and are now ready for the next step.

Having our friends and family fall in love with the product just like we did, gave us the right amount of confidence to set up our Kickstarter Campaign.

Will you help us get the Flower Constellations out there?

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars - pre-order now on Kickstarter / design by House of Thol - photograph by Masha Bakker Photography

Flower Constellations / Effortless arrangements, inspired by the stars - pre-order now on Kickstarter / design by House of Thol - photograph by Masha Bakker Photography

MILESTONE: OUR FIRST 1000 FOLLOWERS ON INSTAGRAM!

27/2/2018

We're super happy with this!
To celebrate, we created a special instagramdiscountcode for all of you.

With a hashtag, of course, because #promiseisapromise and #ithastodowithinstagram.

use that discount code!

The code is valid this whole week and can be used for all products in our webshop.

So #keepyourplantshappy with a nice discount, or drink your coffee with #yourheadintheclouds and a little money leftover for a cup cake.

visit our webshop

psssst....

The prototypes are ready, the photographs have been made, and for the perceptive viewer, we've lifted a few tips of the veil on Instagram:
The Flowerconstellations are on their way!

#whatsyoursign

one more thing

Not following us on Instagram yet? It's fun, i promise.

We share scoops, designs and studio shots like these ones:

follow us on instagram

an angled cut - A rookie's GUIDE TO flower care

13/2/2018

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

Flowers are without a doubt nature's living gems and we should all be surrounded by them all the time. Definitely outdoors (you know, for the bees), but indoors as well.

Flowers embody the freshness, color and sunshine to brighten up any home, and have served as a perfect gift for everyone for hundreds of years.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

That said, everytime someone hands me a bouquet i'm at a loss...
How do i do these beauties justice and keep them fresh and bright for as long as possible?

Judging by the amount of bouquets that i see being just 'tossed' into vases, i'm pretty sure i'm not the only one dealing with the issue.

That's why i dug into it and made you and me this Rookie's guide to Flowercare.
#fistbumb

Let's get to it!

Before we start,
<< here's a pinnable image for you to store and make it easy to visit back whenever you need to. (also: yeeaah, Repins!!)

Now.. on to the real deal:

1. You're handed a bouquet...

As we just agreed on, getting a bunch of flowers is lovely anytime, anywhere.

Yet you don't always have the possibility to immediately find a suitable vase and give the flowers the care they crave and deserve.

How terrible is it to leave the flowers wrapped for a while?

Well, i just visited my own florist, and her advice is not to bother about unwrapping and cutting immediately.
She did however stress the importance of keeping the flowers in water, so find a bucket or container to put the bouquet in water as soon as you can!

With the flowers quenching their thirst, you can leave the proper flower care for a moment when you have the time, up until even te next morning.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

2. About the vase

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

Finding the right vase has everything to do with shape, size, material and design.

The vase should be tall enough, for starters, with that Goldylocks neck that keeps the stems nicely together in their arrangement while giving each flower enough space to breathe.

When push comes to shove, it's almost always that one vase from the most remote corner of the kitchen cabinet above the refrigerator.

But whether you use a €2,- thrifted treasure or a contemporary design icon, your flowers are not happy unless the vase is squeaky clean.

Apparently it's not enough to just get rid of the layer of dust: flowers are susceptible to infection from bacteria and the vase should be properly sterilized.
To keep your flowers fresh for longer, thoroughly clean the vase with soap and water, and add a little bit of bleach, to be on the safe side.

3. The water

First off: Freshly cut flowers in general like their water lukewarm, it makes it easier for them to absorb the moisture.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

That said: bulb flowers, like tulips and daffodils, prefer fresh cold water.

Secondly: Since flowers only take in water through the ends of their stem, it makes sense not to fill up the vase too much to reduce the possibility of bacterial growth from submerged rotting leaves.

There's a debate going on about using filtered water, but that might depend on the quality of your tap water to start with.
Here in the Netherlands, the water supply system is pretty good, so i can't be bothered.

Pro tip:
Tiny air bubbles can clogg flowers' stems and create air-embolism, so when filling the vase, wait for the bubbles in the water to dissipate before the next step.

4. The flower food debate

This is where the internet is going crazy.

There are so many different tales about what you should and shouldn't add to the water to keep your flowers fresh and healthy.

But i've done my research and what it boils down to is this:

Yes, you should definitely use a flower preservative, as it not only provides food for your flowers, but also keeps the water free from bacteria and fungi.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

Of course you can use the commercial preservatives that usually come with the flowers you buy.
Or... you can make your own.

There are loads of home-made alternatives on the interwebs that may or may not work for you.
Getting into that is worthy of a whole new blogpost, and another day.

5. pruning

Now we're finally seeing to the flowers.
First, we need to prevent the water in the vase from being contaminated by rotting leaves.
To avoid bacterial growth in the water, cut off any leaves below the waterline or even touching the water.

Some flowers have guard petals. The two or three outermost petals that for example roses have and which keep the flower from opening completely.
Carefully prune them to make the flower open up even wider.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

6. The angled cut

If you have ever bought a bouquet of flowers, the florist probably told you to "Cut the stems at a 45 degree angle as soon as you get home!".

That's because when flowers are taken out of the water, the cut ends of the stems seal themselves, keeping the water in like a defence-mechanism.

While that's great for transportation, the seal will prevent the flowers taking in fresh water, and needs to be cut off to avoid wilting.

The rule of thumb is to cut 2,5 cm (1") off the stem. Make sure the remaining stem is looking fresh and moist. If you're not sure, cut off a bit more to be on the safe side.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

When cutting, choose garden shears or a sharp knife with a straight edge.
Avoid using your trusty blunt kitchen scissors, you might accidentally squash the stem.

There are a two reasons to cut at a 45 degree angle: You'll decrease the chance of crushing the stems plus you'll increase the surface area for water-absorbtion.

Once cut, don't dilly-dally: get those flowers in the water immediately or the stems will have re-sealed and you can start all over again.

Some flowers, like roses, are susceptible to airbubbles getting trapped in the stem (an air-embolism), to prevent this, cut roses under water.
(i'm sure you'll make it work)

7. arrangement

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer / Flower Constellations by House of Thol - photograph by Masha Bakker Photography

Properly arranging flowers is a bonafide art-form that takes years of training and practice.

Luckily. i'm a fan of a haphazard wildflower bouquet, so no perfectionism holding me back to just (tenderly) throw the flowers in a vase, and rearrange a bit to make it look natural.

If you prefer a tightly styled bouquet like your florist makes, the best tip i can give you is to take your vase to the shop and have them set it up for you. A good florist will happily oblige.

Want to keep that florist style but have to fend for yourself? Whatever you do, don't leave on the wrapping and elastic band.
If you want to do justice to the arrangement, you have to start out with getting a vase with the right neck and overall shape.

Once you've found your Goldilocks vessel, and cleaned it, carefully unwrap the bouquet, prune and cut the flowers and place them one by one.
It might take a bit of practice and a lot of rearranging, but you'll get the hang of it. Eventually.

Want an easy hack? Get our Flower Constellations: durable brass disks with a cut-out pattern based on the star signs, to randomly space your flowers.

Before i forget: If you're arranging your own wildflower bouquet, keep in mind daffodils and hyacinths don't play nice with others: the slimy substance they secrete from their stems will make the other flowers wilt.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

8. Where to keep it

In a still life painting flowers are often next to a bowl of fruit or placed in bright sunlight.

Eventhough that might be pretty composition-wise, if you want to keep your flowers fresh for longer, bright sunlight and ripening fruits should be avoided.

In fact, you want to keep your flowers away from any source of heat. The warmth will speed up the flowers' ageing process (which we don't want).

That said: flowers are also annoyed by drafts, as it accelerates water loss and reduces lifespan.

Then the thing with fruit: ripening fruits release ethylene gas, which makes the flowers ripen and wilt quicker.

Bottom line: pretty much all florists advice to keep your arrangement in a level cool environment with no fruit around.

Still life by Eelke Jelle Eelkesma | 1815-1830 | via Rijksstudio // A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol

Still life by Eelke Jelle Eelkesma | 1815-1830 | via Rijksstudio

A pro tip is to store flowers in a fridge overnight. However this does come with a warning: if the fridge is or ever was used for fruit-storage, the (left-over) ethylene gasses will still make your flowers wilt.

9. Maintenance

In the past i have been adviced to change the water daily, every other day, or to just leave it be.

Judging by all the pro-tips i came across while researching for this post, changing the water every once-in-a-while seems wise, best before it starts to look murky.
Also, when you do, clean the vase, trim the stems and add a little flower food.

If you don't have a lot of time on your hands, at least keep checking the water level daily and top up when neccessary. (Flowers can drain a vase more rapidly than you might think.)

Less invasive, yet as important, is to keep an eye on your bouquet and remove all wilting flowers, brown leaves and drooping petals.

Once a flower starts wilting, it gives off ethylene gass, which we know by now is not great for the life-span of the rest of the bouquet.

Also, when you get rid off the wilting bits, don't leave them near your arrangement. Because, you know, ethylene gas. Throw them out in a proper container and/or in another room.

A Rookie's guide to flower care by House of Thol - 9 steps to keep your flowers fresh for longer

The end...

So, there it is, the complete rookie guide to flower care.
Feel free to add your own flowery wisdom if you like and let's all enjoy our flowers for as long as possible.

Below you'll find an extensive list of sources with links to all original articles.

If you're not exhausted from reading this post, go check them out, they're all highly informative.

sources: Reader's digest, this Wikihow article, this other Wikihow article, this cool mythbusting article by FTD by Design, this thorough article by mental floss, of course these tips from proflowers, rodales organic life, These clever tips from the Telegraph, pro tips from Simplemost, brightside, Woman's Day, Flying Flowers and the Washington Post

PS.

It's not just flowers, we weren't that great with plants either, that's why we created this post about plantcare for the botanically challenged a while ago.
Worth checking out if you can use a little help in that department.

Also, we designed a device to water your plants: Waterworks. Made it a lot easier for us to keep our greenery green and happy.

more about waterworks

teamlab's floating flowers are all i can think of

30/1/2018

Teamlab's floating flowers are all i can think of | photograph by Teamlab

photograph by Teamlab

On this day, while outside the drizzle of rain is being blown horizontally against my window and spring is still far, so far away, i'm dreaming about walking in this flower installation by Japanese interactive designstudio Teamlab.

Teamlab about the installation:
"In Floating Flower Garden, living flowers float up and down in relation to the movement of people in the space."

Teamlab about teamlab:
"Teamlab is an an interdisciplinary group of ultratechnologists whose collaborative practice seeks to navigate the confluence of art, science, technology, design and the natural world.

TeamLab aims to explore a new relationship between humans and nature through art."

The interactive kinetic installation was set up back in 2015, and sadly i haven't been able to visit it in real life.

Luckily, with the video, we can still imagine being there in person.

Get ready to Zen.

Flowery loveliness in the not-so-wild west of Rotterdam

9/2/2016

These lovely bouquets are all made by Susanne Vuyk from Niche Flowershop in Rotterdam.

Aside from beautiful flower arrangements and greenery of all kind, the store offers a large collection of gifts, many of them botanically- or florally-themed.

And, -well, you probably figured that out by now- we're pretty happy to let you know Niche also sells Waterworks!

Worth a mention: Niche has the best Instagram account, all photographs in this post were taken from it.
Follow them for more gorgeous bouquets and flower-themed photographs (lovely close-ups as well!).

Visit the website for more information about the shop, their floral work and the flowery workshops they offer.

Definitely worth a visit next time you're in Rotterdam.

Niche Flowershop
Nieuwe Binnenweg 235a
3021 GC Rotterdam
www.nicherotterdam.nl

Open Tue - Sat 11:00 - 18:00.

Click for store locator

HOUSE OF THOL

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for a green every day

Thomas Linssen & Jana Flohr

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The Netherlands

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