Tabletop
Flower Market or Farmer’s Market?
The best places to get the freshest flowers for your home.
I love how fresh flowers look in my home. I have some in my foyer, some on my breakfast table and usually a few stems in the powder room and in my bathroom (of course!). I even make sure I have a stem or two next to my bed. Of course, if I’m entertaining, I add flowers to wherever we are having cocktails and they are ever present as part of my tablescape in the dining room.
Fresh flowers brighten any room and bring life to any space they’re in. It’s interesting, guests mention that my home always feels welcoming but they don’t equate part of that feeling to the fresh flowers that are always present. But, I’m here to tell you that those flowers absolutely contribute to it.
Many people think that you need to go to a florist to have fresh flowers in your home and that you have to spend a lot of money on arrangements created by professionals. That is absolutely not the case. You can find fresh flowers at most grocery stores but they’re usually not the freshest. They’ll certainly do in a pinch – like if you can’t get to your local Flower Market or your local Farmer’s Market was a few days earlier and you need them ASAP. So, don’t completely write off your grocer’s flowers if that’s what you can get to in the minute – they will do just fine. But, with just a bit of planning you can get the freshest flowers from the flower or farmer’s market for a fraction of what it would cost you at a professional florist. Loose flowers from your grocery store will cost less than from a florist as well.
Talk to the flower merchant at the farmer’s market about which flowers are in season at the minute or simply find ones that you love. Ask which ones will stay freshest longest so you can enjoy them for a few extra days. If I don’t have a particular color theme I’m working with I like to find unusual colors of flowers – like the Mahogany Sun Flowers in the photos – I’d never seen them. Look at all the stems in whichever bunch you are choosing to make sure you don’t have any ‘sad’ flowers.
Be sure to recut the stems when you get home before you place them in water. Any container that can hold water can be used for your arrangements – they don’t have to be vases. In fact, sometimes the more unusual the container the more interesting the flowers look so canning jars, pitchers, glasses, almost anything can be the perfect ‘vase’ for your blooms. Cut them different lengths placing the shortest ones in front and the longest towards the center. I like them just loose.
And now that you know about where to find fresh flowers and how to have them in your home year-round you can save those visits to your local professional florist for when you absolutely must have that perfect arrangement for a special occasion.