The Flowers & Plants Association is funded by a range of companies, including breeders and growers, importers and wholesalers, retailers and designers. On this new page we will bring you updates on our members' businesses.

Want to know what it's like to work in the industry? See our member profiles

Walpole Awards of Excellence 2009

The Real Flower Company have won this year’s 'Emerging British Luxury Brand' award at the Walpole Awards of Excellence 2009.

The ceremony took place on Monday evening 16th November at Banqueting House in Whitehall, London and Walpole; the not-for-profit organisation that represents the British Luxury Industry hosted the evening.

The actor Tom Conti presented the awards to some of the world’s most outstanding brands and individuals and over 500 leading figures from the British and International luxury industries attended the event.

More Information

Kalanchoe ®RoseFlowers® Paris(N) has been awarded the best kalanchoe variety at Hortifair 2009.

The plant was also nominated for the prestigious  ‘Best novelty of the Year’ at the show, in which it came second place.

The Kalanchoe variety, Paris(N), has proven popular for other industry awards this year, including winning ‘Best Blossoming House Plant’ at IPM in January, and the ‘Flor Magazine’ Awards at Flormart, Italy, in September.

The plant is grown in Denmark, contact your local wholesaler for stockists.

More information

"A la mode" - The Society of Floristry Annual Show

Saturday 21st November workshops only -
Sunday 22nd November show day at the EMCC in Nottingham
Download the Society of Floristry Annual Show Leaflet

Expect workshops from Richard Haslam & Laura Leong, Botanical Art with Sarah Horne & Natalie Stayner, Tantalising Textures from Eileen Avery-Scott plus European designer and the launch of The Floral Fashion House.

The show will be packed with trade stands, business seminars, workshops, competitions and a lot of keen florists!

Visit the ‘Annual Show 2009' pages for more details

See the winning designs here

Christmas Preview & BFA Hub Meeting & RHS Chelsea Florist of the Year heat

Wednesday 11 November - New covent garden flower market

Whats On:
- Demonstrations
- Florist Buddy Tours
- BFA ‘RHS Chelsea Florist of the Year’ heat
- Seasonal Displays
- Christmas Exhibition

Find out more here

Botanical Art - For Your Eyes Only

The book is the collaboration of award winning floral designers Sarah Horne AIFD and Jo Jarvis AIFD.  It is a culmination of ideas and inspiration, showing designs ‘outside the box’, the love of nature and the imagination of both these talented designers.

The book will be launched at The Society of Floristry's Annual Show A La Mode November 22nd 2009

See a preview of the book here

Find out more / order a copy

The NAFAS show held at Coventry this year was a resounding success. The standard of the competitive exhibits was extremely high and enjoyed by the thousands that visited the show.

The F&PA trophy was awarded to Barbara Greaves from the Wessex & Jersey area of NAFAS in the class entitled ‘’And There Were Gardens Bright’’. Her exhibit was a worthy winner using some superb garden plant material to create a stunning success.

Dennis van Wonderen meets Her Majesty the Queen at Chelsea Flower Show. She appeared to greatly enjoy the British Florist Association’s display of floral hats (as sported by Dennis himself), admiring the skill and creativity involved - but she wasn’t tempted to swap one permanently for her crown...

Adults one-day Taster Course: Floristry Masterclass
Saturday 22 August - 10:30am-4:00pm

Create your own beautiful floral arrangements inspired by the Dutch flower paintings in the gallery. Incorporating as many types of flowers as possible, these lavish painted bouquets were among the most appreciated and expensive works of art of the golden age. Make your own living paintings using lush flowers and berries.

With Nichlas Vilsmark, Director of Floral Symphonies
£70, £68 concessions and friends, includes light lunch

Contact Sarah Atkinson - 020 8299 8732

Macmillan Cancer Support
Conquer the Alps Cycling Challenge

17-21 September

Gonnen Eilat is challenging the Alps between 17th and 21st of September. Cycling some of the most grueling and tough up hills of the Tour De-France

Information about Macmillan and the cycle challenge Gonnen is taking part in can be found here.

To sponsor Gonnen or to see how much he has raised so far please visit his fundraising page

F&PA Chelsea Winners

Johnny Walkers of Taylors bulbs

Won 22 gold medals in 24 years of exhibiting.

Sarah Horne

Won a silver gilt for her flamboyant hat design, and got voted first out of all the entrants in the public’s vote. Come and see her demonstrate for the Flowers & Plants Association on
12th June at BBC Gardener’s World Live
and
7th July at Hampton Court Flower Show.

Louise Roffey and Sarochi Promsiri of Southwark College

Won a gold medal each for their hat designs.

Zita Elze

Won a silver-gilt for her fairytale garden design

Somerset Postal flowers

Won a bronze for their display of floral creations

Floral High Notes

Ian Lloyd and Helena Leonard entered their act into TV'S Britain’s Got Talent. Both Piers Morgan and Amanda Holden enjoyed the act, enabling Ian & Helena to progress to the next stage of the competition.

In the act Ian makes a flower arrangement while Helena sings opera - to "demonstrate the synergy between opera and flowers".

Click the link on the right to see their performance.

Zita Elze wins Silver-Gilt in her Chelsea debut

The inspirational designer and wedding florist Zita Elze has won a top medal for her first ever Show Garden - the simply exquisite 'A Celebration of Life' at this year's RHS Chelsea Flower Show.

Watch Zita's interview with BBC presenter Rachel de Thame which opened Wednesday's show.

For more details visit Zita's website and click into the news section

Borneo bound!

Alex Summers, the winner of 2009’s Young Horticulturist of the Year competition. The final was held on the 9th May at the National Botanical Garden of Wales.

Alex, pictured, triumphed over his 7 fellow competitors with part-time grower and Writtle College student James Hearsum, second and Madingley Hall Head Gardener Faye Steer, in third place.

Read More > >

Flowers for Funerals with Claire Cowling of Thrive Floristry

On the morning of Wednesday 29 April (8am to 10am) Claire will be taking the audience through innovative design ideas and techniques to create beautiful floral tributes at a range of price points. Andrea Caldecourt of the F&PA will be our compere, and a tutor from Southwark College will talk us through the topic of 'diverse floral tributes'.

Newcomers to the Flower market will be invited to attend Florist Buddy tours at 7.15am and 10am, whilst Thrive Floristry will be offering a wide range of publications for visitors to purchase that morning. See more

New Covent Garden Market Celebration of Spring
4th March, London

With designer demonstrations using seasonal flowers from the market, floral installations from member Zita Elze and others, along with tours and advice, there was much to see at the CGMA event. Andrea Caldecourt, Chief Executive, compered the morning's activities.

For more information or for future event news, www.newcoventgardenmarket.com

New Covent Garden Market College Days

Sarah Holland, Communications Manager, judged the 21 entries from 10 colleges along with foliage wholesaler Barry Porter. Winner Plumpton college produced a design that was well-sourced and well made; other creative and attractive designs were also produced by F&PA member colleges.

It's great to see how inspiring the next wave of budding florists are, they're sure to be keeping abreast of the seasonal flower fashion trends from the Flowers & Plants Association!

Welsh College Students Create Floral Artworks for ALDI Supermarket

Welsh College of Horticulture Floristry students were recently commissioned to interpret the work of some of the finest artists of all time. 
The students recreated famous paintings such as Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, and Monet’s Water Lilies, in 12ft by 12ft frames using just flowers and foliage! Read More

Grower of the Year Awards 2009

The Grower of the Year Awards 2009 are about celebrating the best examples of business excellence, innovation, technical expertise and personal achievement within UK production horticulture in the last 18 months.

Congratulations to The Real Flower Company who won 'Cut Flower Grower of the Year'. Read More >

The Grower of the Year Awards 2009

Churchtown Farm, a flower farm based on the Isles of Scilly which specialises in
sending scented flowers by post, has reached the final of The Grower of the Year Awards which is the horticultural equivalent of the Oscars

Read More > >

The RHS Chelsea Florist of the Year Competition

RHS Chelsea Flower Show - May

Have you got what it takes?

The Royal Horticultural Society is proud to announce the launch of ‘The RHS Chelsea Florist of the Year’ competition in association with the British Florist Association.
This competition is to be held at the world’s most famous flower show in Chelsea, London and showcases the very best in professional retail floristry.

www.britishfloristassociation.org

Thrive Floristry Launch New Magazine
'Flowers for Funerals'

In the UK each year there are around 500,000 deaths, which, coincidentally is almost double the number of marriages.

Thrive Floristry feel the time is right for florist’s to explore and increase this important part of their business.

It is uplifting and in no way morbid; design led, rather than advertising led, and although the designs are primarily for funerals, many of them can easily be used or adapted for other functions or occasions.

The magazine will be published quarterly; some of the designs will be seasonal to reflect the time of year, others contemporary, the remainder traditional. There will be around 75 designs in each issue as well as relevant articles and interesting floral facts and trivia.

Thrive Floristry Website

Webbs - Garden Centre of the Year 2008

Staff at Webbs, the UK's Garden Centre of the Year 2008, celebrated another year of triumph with their own red carpet awards ceremony.

Almost 200 Webbs staff turned out to the fourth annual ceremony at The Pear Tree Inn, Smite, to find out who were the stars scooping this year’s top awards.
Certificates and prizes were presented to staff to celebrate a wide range of training initiatives and individual and department successes over the last year, including the crowning achievement of winning UK Garden Centre of the Year from the Garden Centre Association (GCA), the organisation representing the best garden retailers in Britain, for the second year running.

Webbs Website

Thrive Floristry

Member florist Claire Cowling of Thrive Floristry teamed up with member rose breeder and grower David Austin Roses recently, creating wedding designs for the rose growers' new set of wedding images.

Her wedding designs have also been featured in the most recent issues Fusion Weddings magazine and the International Annual of Floral Art.

Claire runs workshops and has a host of corporate clients. For more information or to buy the titles where Claire's work has been featured, visit

Thrive Floristry Website