Flower and Fern
Growing into to my Origins
It was 2017 and we were in the midst of planning our upcoming wedding that September. Wanting to make the day as personal as possible, we asked my mother to grow flowers for our big day in her garden and bring them down to the south coast of England where we live and were tying the knot. I had a rural upbringing in Nottinghamshire where our garden was and still is very important, and much of my childhood was spent in it, building dens under the shimmering birch trees and catching tiny fish in the stream that runs through our village. It was the perfect way to bring my family home and my new life in Sussex together.
I moved to the south coast to study fashion design at university 12 years ago, and it’s there that I met my future husband and settled into city life and started a career in accessories buying. After a few years on this trajectory I realised that having a seemingly creative yet office based job was no longer something I wanted to do, but it wasn’t until some time after I’d made our wedding flowers that I realised I wanted to become a florist.
After our wedding, I came across the work of Studio Mondine, Lambert Floral Studio and Marigold SF and found their floral arrangements captivating. They weren’t stuffy and old fashioned like my preconceived ideas of floristry; they were conceptual, sophisticated and cool. I loved the nuanced colour palettes, seasonal ingredients and their considered approach to design. The idea that I could combine my admiration of this Californian floral style and my English country roots was exciting and so I enrolled on a floristry course to learn the skills.
Since then my approach to floral art has remained the same: I look to nature for inspiration and to the seasons for my ingredients, combining them in an intentional way. Starting a wedding and event floral design company has enabled me to find my passion for creative work again, by staying true to myself as well as getting to create memorable florals for my clients that bring them joy.
This Thanksgiving table was a personal project this autumn. It’s a nod to my love of Californian floral design, with autumnal birch branches as my inspirational starting point.
The expressive movement of the birch evokes memories of my childhood garden, and the rich colours of the yellowing leaves are continued through the candles, plates and blooms that I chose. This process both excites me creatively and has a calming effect as I concentrate on the process: foraging the branches, preparing the blooms, setting the table. Due to the temporary nature of flowers, the desire to do each fleeting bloom justice in the arrangement is strong and requires focus and consideration. It’s through this floral practice, from the initial idea through to completion, that I’ve found I’ve both grown as a creative and reconnected to my origins. I would say to aspiring florists out there: lean into what excites you, explore ideas that have meaning to you, and most of all enjoy the process as much as the outcome.
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Liz Mathers Carter is the owner and head florist of Flower and Fern, a wedding and event floral design studio based in West Sussex.
Liz is inspired by the clean modernity of Californian style and floral design, and balances this with the softness of seasonal, locally sourced blooms and nuanced colour palettes in her work.
When she’s not creating beautiful designs for her client’s events, she can be found taking long walks with her husband and border terrier in the South Downs, gardening or cooking and baking in their kitchen.’
Profile Photography by Leah Marie Photography.