Iron Craft 2015 Challenge #22--Fall Flowers

Inspiration

This is going to be a bit of a strange post. For this challenge, we were tasked to create something dedicated to Fall colors. Orange has always been one of my favorite colors so I knew which direction I was headed. I love color and color theory and people are always asking me what inspires me and affects my color sense. After reading the posted challenge, I was walking by one of the Manhattan bodegas. In Manhattan, we always have flowers and foliage available for last minute gifts. As I was walking past, I noticed the above flower arrangement and decided to immediately do a floral arrangement for this challenge.

What many of you might not know is that I have always loved flowers. One of my only regrets about living in NYC is not being able to garden. I would love to have a plot of land to grow flowers for arrangements. If I had the chance to redo my life, I would have been a gardener and/or florist.

There were so many beautiful blooms available. I found these yellow and yellow/brown Calla Lilies.

Yellow Calla Lilies

There were also Dahlias in yellows, golds and oranges.

Dahlia

I fell in love with these Pumpkin Trees which I had never seen before. I found out that they were actually ornamental eggplants. Unfortunately, they were out-of-stock when I went back to the store.

Pumpkin Tree/Pumpkin on a stick

These Lantern Flowers have always intrigued me. They apparently intrigued everyone else because they were gone when I went back to buy them.

Chinese Lantern Flowers

And you can't have a Fall arrangement without berries and buds. I don't know this specific variety but they definitely fit the theme.

Berries & Buds

As I was deciding what to use for my arrangement, I decided on the Dahlias and Calla Lilies as my main flowers. For height, I added curly willow and cattails. I used lemon leaves, berries and some buds to fill out the arrangement.

Raw Materials

Below is the result. I am very happy with the result and gave it to a friend who needed some cheering up.

The Final Arrangement

I am always amazed at the overhead in flower arrangements. I really don't think that a simple arrangement like this is very difficult to do. If I had purchased this arrangement from a florist it would have been between $80 to $100. I already had the vase and the flowers totaled $25.