LYDIA'S GARDEN

WITH SAMANTHA DUSTING

"Lydia's Garden is a tribute to my wonderful Grandma, Lydia Alice, affectionately know to all as Mickee. She had an amazing Victorian cottage garden and shared her love of flowers with my sister Emma and I. When we visited we were given a basket and a pair of snips and allowed to cut as many flowers as we liked."

At what point did you decide to make floristry your career? And are you self-taught or did you do a course? My friend Adele had a wedding styling/decor business and had booked a wedding at Versace that she needed a florist for. She asked if I thought I’d be able to do it as she knew about my love of flowers – thankfully the wedding wasn’t until the following year and it gave me enough time to complete a floristry course with Gold Coast School of Floristry. Talk about a baptism of fire, it was a huge Sri Lankan wedding with masses of flowers, lots of colour and music and beautiful traditional ceremonies. I specialised in wedding floristry from 2007. When Michelle Roper-Dennis bought My Country Escape eight years ago I offered to help her with the shop flowers and you could say our friendship has blossomed since then (pun intended!).

What is it about the process that you love most? Or perhaps you have a number of things that you love about creating floral art? I love going to the flower markets (despite the really early start!) and seeing what’s fresh, locally grown and choosing my colour palette.

Where do you draw your inspiration from? What’s on trend, seasonal inspo, or any sites or people that you like to follow? Oh gosh, my inspiration comes from so many different places. I love Sarah Rhyanen from Saipua, she’s got a beautiful, loose, airy, thrown together floral style that looks so effortless but is really difficult. Trends come and go and personally I prefer not to follow them, I’d rather just do ‘my style’ and if people like to buy and appreciate my flowers, well that’s enough for me.

Is there a specific personal style that you most enjoy, or do you like to mix it up and produce different styles depending on the brief? I love making bouquets that look like you’ve just swept your arm through the garden and gathered up a bunch, nothing too organised or structured. Almost like floral doodling! Nature is so beautiful the way it is so random and I like to try and recreate that.

What would be your dream project to work on? I would love to do a floral installation for my favourite artist, Jane Guthleben, next exhibition. She paints incredible Dutch Master style paintings featuring Australian native flora. Check her out!

What do you have in mind for the future growth of your business? Would you consider doing workshops for people interested in floral artistry? I’m pretty happy with how Lydia’s Garden is evolving, at the moment I am kept really busy with bouquets and orders for the shop, weddings and have just started offering deliveries within the Scenic Rim area. I’d be really chuffed if my daughters decided they wanted to join me in the future! I’ve held a few wreath workshops, and Christmas table centrepiece workshops in the past and would definitely do them again. I’ve got a few other workshops in the pipeline - watch this space!

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