Local Cut Flowers with Debra Prinzing

This Week's Podcast: A Replay: The Local Flower Movement's Champion, Debra Prinzing

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This week, Debra Prinzing is our guest and we celebrate the publication of
her latest book, Slow Flowers, in which she shows arrangements using locally grown
plants.
Debra is a Seattle-based outdoor-living expert who writes and lectures
on gardens and home design. She is a contributing editor for Better Homes &
Gardens
and her feature stories appear in the home section of the Los Angeles
Times. Debra also serves as the president of the Garden Writers Association.
The slow food movement has changed our relationship to
what we eat, and now the slow flower movement is changing the way we think
about cut flowers. One challenge is to do that through the winter.
“Yes, we’d all prefer fresh, fragrant flowers in our
bouquets, not the chemical-laden ‘undead’ blooms flown in from afar,” she says.
How to do that in winter? Debra shows 52 weeks of arrangements including ones
made with ornamental twigs, fruit, foliage, greenhouse plants, dried pods and
more (A bowl of pink and cream flowers
and fruit, below).
Slow Flowersis
written from a DIY floral designer’s perspective, to inspire anyone to go green
with what’s at hand, no matter the season.
The book provides extensive design
tips, bouquet “recipes,” suggestions from how to build a hidden superstructure
for an arrangement, to tips to make flowers last longest. Debra includes a region-by-region
floral ingredient list of things to find in all climate zones through the
year.I’d say that if it is impractical to send someone a locally grown
bouquet, send a copy of this lovely little book.