Floral Design Studio at Flora Grubb Gardens

When Flora Grubb added a floral-design studio to her San Francisco garden boutique and nursery this past fall, she created it with intent. The Cutting Garden would use only in-season California-grown materials, and strive to inspire clients to grow and gather bouquets in their gardens at home. Enter floral designer Susie Nadler, a San Francisco native who finds inspiration in materials seen in her everyday surroundings. “For me, they evoke emotions that are very personal and tied to my own sense of place and home.”

For this textural and wild-looking arrangement, Nadler added dashes of Golden Gate Park, as seen in the yellow-orange Kniphofia, Japanese maple (Acer palmatum) and Japanese andromeda (Pieris japonica). Then Nadler included some of her favorites: eucalyptus for its fragrance and texture, the white-leaved plant with the red center, Leucadendron ‘Pom Pom’, for its longevity — at least 10 days in the vase — and for its tulip shape that is “perfect for filling in holes,” and the wispy, lavender cilantro flowers that are “fragrant and herby.” Adds Nadler: “Part of what the Cutting Garden is all about is using whatever you can find in your garden. Not just the big blooms, but unexpected flowers like the blooms of an herb gone to seed.”

Nadler centers and completes her arrangement with a few succulent varieties that she transforms into cut flowers by “cleaning them down to the stem, removing any threadlike roots and lower leaves, and then inserting a wire into the stem so I can place the plants where I want them.” Once the rest of the arrangement is past its prime, the succulents can be planted again in the garden. “Can’t get more sustainable than that,” says Nadler. floragrubb.com  

Early-season farmers’ market anemones with some leucadendron ‘Safari Sunset’ and hardenbergia vine cut from Susie’s garden, along with a few stems of pieris left over from an event. The pitcher belonged to the grandmother of Susie’s husband, Saul (who is also an owner of Flora Grubb Gardens!).

A centerpiece for a business luncheon at a private home in Woodside, CA. With gorgeous deep purple lilacs, leucadendron ‘Maui Sunset,’ sempervivum, dusty miller, berzelia, locally grown orchids, and of course the lovely big tillandsia for contrast.

Believe it or not, this was a holiday bouquet; December means “fall” foliage in the Bay Area. The creamy protea and pale gray echeveria succulents are a lovely counterpoint to the deep red liquidambar leaves and the bright pink blooming eucalyptus. With some acacia cut from one of the nursery’s own trees, cute arbutus berries, and asclepia for more fun round shapes.

A bouquet for a good friend’s bridal shower. The first of the pink dogwood looked amazing with the green aeonium and leucospermum in purple and vibrant peach. Asparagus plumosa always lends a lovely softness to a bouquet.

For Valentine’s Day, Susie and Flora came up with this bouquet of a dozen “roses”: rosettes of the deep pink echeveria ‘Perle Von Nurnberg,’ with some white peacock feathers for a nice dose of drama.

Those varicolored ranunculus started cropping up in March, and they were irresistible. The little white clematis here is kind of a rare find, as well. With ceanothus, a California native, along with a few echeveria rosettes, a little starburst-shaped leucadendron, and rice flower.

Susie made mossy log centerpieces like this one for Flora’s brother Jonathan Grubb’s seaside wedding. The tillandsias and succulents “growing” on the lichen-covered branch are meant to evoke the shapes and forms of sea creatures and coastal plants.

This bouquet was inspired by the combination of the red Japanese maple with that gorgeous deep burgundy (locally grown) catteleya orchid. With snowball viburnum, wild forget-me-nots, pale purple scabiosa, and berzelia for contrast; wispy cilantro flowers add a bit of wildness.

Tillandsias were the focal “flowers” in the Mother’s Day bouquet. They inspired Susie to play around with strange shapes; here she used kniphofia, snowball viburnum, Spanish lavender, tweedia, and Japanese maple.

Antique hydrangea are so elegant in a tarnished silver vase. For this one Susie paired them with blooming arbutus branches, oak leaves, some wispy miscanthus grass, and the bright magenta flowers of Calandrinia spectabilis, a prolific-blooming succulent.

For the San Francisco Ballet Auxiliary gala, Susie created these otherworldly succulent bowls, with various echeveria rosettes, a few tillandsias, and a gorgeous (organic!) tulip-shaped leucadendron for fullness.