As many of us know, District V is planning to have a Flower Show in May. The design categories are varied and some are challenging without a refresher. So, Marilyn Potter has been volunteering her time to teach interested students how to tackle each design class. I attended strictly as a recorder, but we had a good contingent of participants from CGC there–Carmen, Jackie, Brenda, Marjorie and Terry. Everyone brings their own tools, floral materials and containers, Marilyn gives a short how-to lecture and makes herself available for consult. Afterwords, all finished designs are brought to one table for critical judging and suggestions for improvement for entry in the show.
We learned about using a design square to make certain all dimensions of the design were within the required parameters given in the rules. We saw how the scale of the container to the floral material was very important and how a container thought to be a good choice at first can prove to be a challenge! When adding the geometric elements, we found that they were an essential part of this design and need to stand out, not be added as a numerical afterthought.
Participants from many clubs attended and brought many unusual bits and pieces of berried plants, shrubs with bitsy leaves, grasses and tiny flowers to be in scale with miniatures. Marilyn showed us how a flower may be cut with scissors to add a straight edged geometric element or a bloom may be disassembled into component parts to be used in design. One table did exquisite micro designs but they would not have been accepted per the rules of this Miniature Class in the show.
I enjoyed watching the process unfold as all designers tried to find what worked for them out of their materials and how a judge would look at these designs and determine where any points would be removed from the 100 all begin with.
Judging at the end inside the sizing square:
