Fleur East Collection
Dry Arrangements

The art and style of dried flower arranging has changed dramatically reaching new heights in recent times. A spectrum of new materials are employed to emphasize color, textures and sculptural shapes for a bolder and more stylized look. They are not confined to just dried flowers per se but to a whole gamut of botanical products and by-products like fungi, berries, vines, barks, grasses and coco fibers to name some.

This section of the website shows the many wonderful ways of using dried arrangements in interiors. I used a lot of local materials which are not commercially available. Most materials used are self-dryed and preserved through trial and error. To me, that is half the fun and I will share with you what I have learned in the Workbook later.

The hanging clump of air-dried bamboo decorates the underside of a boring staircase that stares in my living room in Manila. I partially sprayed the dried leaves with paint in two tones, oriental and copper gold, to make the bamboo leaves look rich and opulent. The falling maroon-colored amaranthus caudatus also known as love-lies-bleeding adds color and interest to this minimalist arrangement. The 9 feet height and volume makes it stunningly elegant in its simplicity.

In my one-man show in the Philippines in 1977, I used dried elements for the first time in my design. The hanging dried anahaw leaves, actually a farmers raincoat in the Philippines, appears floating and falling over an Oriental vignette below injecting a dramatic feature in a modern showroom. The frilly edges of the anahaw leaves are gold leafed to create an effect when viewed from below. The shape and lines of the leaves juxtoposed with the vertical lines of the blinds make a pleasing visual tension.