Lush flowers in abundance at our biggest local florist

By James Mullan

It’s apparently the biggest florist on the North Side of the bridge. The brand new Lush has opened its doors at 115 Military Road, Neutral Bay and is offering an incredible 110 different varieties of flowers. We spoke with owner Jack Maatouk to find out what is so special about this newly bloomed business.

Maatouk is the third generation of his family to work in the flower industry with his grandparents and parents all working as either growers or retailers. His parents ran the Blossoms of Paradise stores in the Eastern Suburbs and Mona Vale, the latter almost being the site of Jack’s birth.

“I grew up in the shop. 3am wake ups going out with Dad to growers….. Opening and closing the shop, changing water buckets, cutting flowers.”

But it’s not just Jack’s family who have floristry in their DNA. His wife’s family ran Singapore’s largest florist for 25 years: “She never told me she and her family were florists until two years after we met!”

Both families are hands on deck at Lush and Maatouk says this connection is part of the reason he kicked off the business.

After spending years in the corporate world, Maatouk realised he wanted more than the office could provide.

“My parents put us through uni, I studied, doing a Bachelor of Commerce and Masters in Business Administration and rose to the top levels pretty quickly.”

“I grew up in a small business with the early wake ups, dealing with customers face to face and that’s what brought me back to the business.”

The quality shows as you walk in from bustling Military Road. The array of colours, styles and fragrance is immediately noticeable.

Maatouk still buys from many of the same growers he met through his father years ago, continuing the commitment to buying straight from the source rather than going to wholesalers. This isn’t easy as most growers are on the outskirts of Sydney or beyond like the Central Coast, Hawkesbury and the Blue Mountains.

“You don’t get them any fresher than when you pick them yourself,” he emphasised.

Once the flowers arrive in Neutral Bay they are trimmed, put into hand washed buckets and immersed in specialised water from a PH tap which adds extra potassium and magnesium.

This increases the flowers life span by 60% according to Maatouk. They also switch the water every 72 hours.

Additionally, they focus on freshness by using a cool room.

“We control them in the cool room with about 3-6 degrees temperature, which enhances the life of the flower,” which he says extends the life of the flower by around 3 weeks.

“People are used to having flowers and they just die within a week. That’s not normal,” adding “Our goal is different, we get it very young and they are temperature managed so we can mature them naturally and then sell them ready to present.”

“A normal florist is 50-60 sqm. They hold a variety of about 30-40 flowers. We’ve gone to the hyper end of the spectrum with 100 different varieties,” Maatouk said.

As for his top picks, the lilies which are grown on the Central Coast are a favourite. “They give us lilies which are so fresh that we can’t even sell them straight away.”

Other standouts include the chrysanthemums and roses, which come from Kempsey. Some flowers even come straight from his father’s backyard in Turramurra.

As for the imported flowers, the extremely rare striped roses from Ecuador are simply stunning.

Lush offers customised arrangements with wrapping as well as gifts, chocolates, succulents, cards and many more treats.