Struttin' With the Peacocks

The Newport Flower Show

One of the pleasures of being married to a serious gardener who also happens to be a Master floral design judge is that you get to tag along to the darnest things.

The Newport Flower Show is held annually toward the end of June.  It’s a wonderful event, held for a worthy cause (the Preservation Society of Newport County), and held in a jaw-dropping setting (Rosecliff, an oceanfront estate owned and maintained by the aforementioned Preservation Society).  I’ve been to the show several times and even once helped to build an exhibit there. 

Betty, Dave, and Sandy at Crane Beach

This year was special:  Betty was invited to judge its flower show, and two good friends were arriving from the Midwest who were also judging.  Being asked to judge at Newport is a big deal; judges fly in in from all over the country.  Sandy, our friend from Kentucky, and Dave, our friend from Illinois, agreed to come a few days early so we could take them to our favorite beach and clam shack, and otherwise show them a small slice of ‘our’ New England.

I thought my role in all of this ended when we had dinner before we dropped them at their hotel on our third evening together.  Instead, they casually asked Betty (and, politely, included me) if she had a few spare hours the next day to, well, assemble a pair of peacocks.  Betty enthusiastically agreed.  The following afternoon, we were on the magnificent grounds of Rosecliff.

Dave directs Sue Redden, our
fellow volunteer

The project seemed simple: here is a four-foot-wide fountain on a pedestal; part of Rosecliff’s original design and, more or less, the centerpiece of its front lawn.  Here are the wire-frame heads and bodies of two over-sized peacocks, ready to be covered with green moss, plus an assortment of additional wire cages.  Here is a box of Oasis, a water-retaining product used by floral designers to keep their material fresh.  Oh, and here are a dozen buckets filled with roses, orchids, sea holly, hydrangea, eucalyptus, thistle, and other materials whose names I can only guess.

Betty puts the finishing touches
on the first peacock

Dave had been given a vague design of what the finished peacocks were supposed to look like.  The design, unfortunately, ignored some basic laws of gravity and physics.  The peacock perched on the edge of the fountain would never stay upright.  Moreover, the wire cages meant to hold the Oasis didn’t include openings large enough to insert blocks of the stuff.  My first job as ‘helper’ was to canvass the estate to cadge wire cutters.

With monumental bags of sand and rocks, plus enough florist and duct tape to wrap a mummy, the first peacock was made to stand at the lip of the fountain, and an assemblage of Oasis-filled cages were ingeniously joined to anchor the bird to the ground.  The peacock’s tail, five feet long and two feet wide, was created.  Dave and Sandy worked together, calling for floral material prepped by Betty and another volunteer, Sue.  I cleared debris and fetched additional flowers from buckets kept under a tent some distance away (did I mention Newport was encased in fog so thick you couldn’t see Rosecliff a hundred yards away? Or that it periodically rained?)

The second peacock takes
shape, as it rains harder

The first peacock was finished and Dave and Sandy set out to create the second one, thankfully located on the ground at the base of the fountain, but with a five-foot-wide fan of floral ‘feathers’.  Sandy worked from the back; Dave from the front.  Betty was ordered into service placing flowers, and I prepped material while keeping the mounting pile of debris in check. 

Meanwhile, people wandered by and many stopped to stare with a sense of awe at what was being conjured up from sleight-of-hand plus a wealth of design knowledge.  Two teams of landscape judges were disappointed they couldn’t give our work an award (this was ‘sponsored art’ for a Newport bank and, thus, ineligible).  

Sandy does a final
inspection, including a
'fountain' from leftovers

After nearly three hours (including several ‘rain delays’), the peacocks were finished.  Although not in the original design, Dave and Betty used leftover flowers to create a ‘fountain’ from which the first peacock was drinking.  The completed vignette was stunning – for which I take no credit – and free of debris (my proud contribution).

That night at the judges’ dinner, the peacocks were the talk of the room.  Dave and Sandy shared credit freely, but I think everyone knew who were the artists and who were the worker bees.  Emboldened, though, I asked the Chair of Judges if she might be able to use an extra set of hands the following morning when judges assembled to do the work for which they had traveled from afar.  She gave it some thought and tapped her chin.  “You know,” she said, “we could use another runner.”

But that’s a different story.

Rescue Me

Being the spouse of the President of the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts brings multiple Honors and Benefits, not the least of which is the frequent opportunity to be Presidential Arm Candy for garden club events (‘arm candy’ being a much better job description than ‘driver’).  In a given month, Betty receives as many as twenty invitations to various events, which she accepts on a first-invited-first-accepted basis.  In the peak months of November and April she frequently does two events a day (she once did three events in three widely separated towns in a day and swore she would never do so again).

The topiaried
cypress, about
which more will
be said in
a moment

November and December events are usually festive ones built around a holiday theme.  Clubs bring in ‘big name’ designers or otherwise pull out all the stops.  It’s also a time when clubs in the same or neighboring towns get together and pool their resources for a big splash; the better to make that big event affordable to even small clubs.

And also, by some unspoken protocol, the Federation President is offered the opportunity (some would say ‘obliged’) to take the best seat in the house for whatever presentation is being done.  Betty invariably protests that no fuss need be made.  Then she is shown that front-row seat with her name taped to it.

All of the preceding is necessary background to understand the events of about three weeks ago, and how I came to rescue three cypress trees from cruel and unusual punishment.

The Spring Grow Expo in 2016

Each year in November, five clubs in Topsfield, Boxford and Middleton hold a “Tri-Town meeting”.  It’s a rather elegant soiree held at an appropriate site.  Betty was especially pleased to be invited this year because one of the participating clubs holds an environmental fair each spring, and she was looking forward to talking with that club’s members.  This 2016 edition of the event was held at Topsfield Common, an historic building on that town’s original town green.  We arrived to find more than a hundred women dining on canapes and thoroughly enjoying themselves.  Betty was immediately swept into multiple conversations and so I tried to make myself inconspicuous; no small feat when you are the only person of the male persuasion in a rapidly growing crowd.  When the program began, Betty found herself ushered to the front of the hall and I found that a seat had been marked off for me beside her. 

Topiaries at Snug Harbor Farm

A brief word about garden club holiday programs. While a 'normal' month’s program may feature a speaker on the environment, landscaping, gardening, or even gardening humor; a holiday program invariably centers on floral design.  One of the 'big names' in design is booked and never fails to delight the audience.  Betty has been to enough of these events that one of those big names, Tony Todesco, believes she is stalking him. 

To be a 'big name', you must be more than just a good designer: you must also have a great 'patter'.  Watching anyone – even the most talented designer – put together five or six floral arrangements over 90 minutes can be a deadly dull experience.  What makes it enjoyable and even riveting is the accompanying patter.  The designer tells stories as he or she works, and it is those stories – always humorous and also often autobiographical – that are just as memorable as the designs.

Tony Elliott

The name on the program that evening, though, was a new one to me: Tony Elliott.  The topic, though, seemed a familiar one: ‘The Holiday Table’.  It turns out that Tony is the owner and proprietor of a specialty garden center called Snug Harbor Farm in Kennebunk, Maine, some 50 miles up the coast from Topsfield.  On the stage in front of us was a mass of vegetables, plants, and flowers.

Tony began by showing the audience how to make a topiary.  He did so because one of Snug Harbor Farm’s specialties is topiary.  To demonstrate, he brought out a beautiful small cypress, perhaps twelve inches high.  The plant was beautifully proportioned and in wonderful condition.  It was the kind of plant anyone would be proud to own.  Tony began to cut it.  Not nice little cuts to perhaps shape it; he took off an entire branch. 

The audience gasped.  Being in the front row, I saw the carnage from a distance of just five feet.

He cut more of the cypress.  Another branch fell to the floor.  The audience cried out for him to stop.  He kept cutting, whacking, hacking, until all that remained of that beautiful cypress was its stem and a small top knot.

He held it up for the audience to see.  The audience was in shock. 

He picked up another cypress.  “Shall I show you again?” he asked.  There seemed to be a gleam in his eye.

The two un-molested cypresses will
spend the winter as indoor ornamentals.
They are not hardy in New England, so
their long-term fate is uncertain.

The audience begged him to spare it.

The balance of the presentation, at least to me, was a blur.  I know he used a blue squash as a container for a floral centerpiece, but my mind was still on that poor cypress.

To defray the cost of a program, there are always 'opportunity drawings'  (the approved IRS terminology) and the creations of the designer are auctioned off.  An hour after he began, Tony Elliott had filled a large table with designs.  The auction began.

Three cypresses – the one turned into the beginning of a topiary – and two that had been given a stay of execution in the interest of time were part of the auction.  Bidding began.  I raised my hand.  I wanted to spare those poor cypresses.  Someone else raised their hand.  I raised mine again.  And so it went until the bidding reached $40.  Mind you, I could buy those three cypresses for six or seven dollars each at any decent nursery.  But these cypresses were being held hostage by a man who would butcher them without a second thought.

I raised my hand one more time.  “I will rescue them for $45,” I shouted.  The audience broke out in laughter. 

The three cypresses will grace the mantle over our fireplace this winter.  In the spring, we will find a place for all three outdoors.  They're not hardy hereabouts, but whatever fate awaits that cypress, it will know a kinder future than it experienced on a stage in Topsfield one evening in November.

Coming Soon: The End of an Era

If you live in southern New England and you ever thought a florist or floral designer did an especially imaginative job choosing the flowers for a wedding, flower show, or garden club presentation, you should probably include the Boston Flower Exchange in your thanks.  At the ‘flower exchange’, as most people refer to it, the aforementioned florists and designers can browse 13 wholesalers under one, 75,000-square-foot roof that is wall-to-wall displays.

The flower exchange is a venerable institution that has its origins back when greenhouses in the hinterlands around the city grew summer and winter blooms (notably carnations, roses and camellias) for the carriage trade.  Over time, ‘outside’ flowers were allowed in. 

Today, the source of most flowers is South America and the Netherlands.  They’re flown in overnight and, beginning at 2 a.m., the flower exchange wholesalers collect their orders at Logan Airport, bring them to the market, sort them, and have them ready for sale before 5 a.m.  I can attest that at 6 a.m. the flower exchange is in high gear.  By 9 a.m. the stalls are mostly bare and the market formally closes at noon.

The beauty of the flower exchange is the breadth of offering and specialization.  One stall specializes in ‘tropicals’, another in orchids.  If you can’t find the right shade of the specific flower you need at Chester Brown, try Cupp & Cupp or Carbone.  If you need 100 dozen roses in the exact same hue of cream for a wedding next Saturday, explain you need to the salesman at Riccardi and let them ensure your order is filled.

Inside the flower exchange

Although not part of the Boston Flower Exchange, life for those florists and designers is made easier still by the presence of Jacobson Floral Supply.  Housed in a supermarket-sized building adjacent to the flower exchange, Jacobson offers everything imaginable (except cut flowers) someone could need. 

You would think that every city would have its own flower exchange.  You would be wrong.  Most cities – including most major cities – have widely dispersed wholesalers, requiring florists and designers to either establish a strong rapport with one of those wholesalers, or else to drive from one end of (say) Houston to the other to find what they need.   Out-of-town designers who come to Boston for events have nothing but high praise the institution, and uniformly wish it was replicated back they came from.

When the flower exchange (center,
with Jacobson's just to the left) was
built, the neighborhood was seedy

You would also think that the future of the Boston Flower Exchange would be as secure as the North End’s Paul Revere statue.  Again, you would be wrong.  The flower exchange led a peripatetic existence for decades before settling in the old Cyclorama Building in the South End in 1923.  By 1963, however, that building’s future was threatened by redevelopment and the Exchange’s Board of Directors went looking for a permanent home.

They found it a mile away in a desolate, 5.6 acre plot hard by the elevated Southeast Expressway amid gritty, abandoned industrial loft buildings.  Built on land that was once part of Boston Harbor, a functional, one-story building with ample parking and loading docks opened in 1971.  Jacobson Floral Design built their store on an adjoining plot.  For more than four decades, florists and designers had a readily accessible, central market where the lone complaint was crime (ameliorated by a steel fence around the perimeter of the property, and then more recently by a much improving neighborhood).

Today, the flower exchange sits atop
a 'hot' property and has been sold

But in the second decade of the new century, that part of South Boston has become exceptionally attractive to developers.  In September 2014, the Exchange’s Board received an unsolicited offer of more than $35 million for the site.  Other offers quickly followed.  In May 2015, the vendors who make up the Board voted overwhelmingly to accept the offer from a still-unidentified buyer.  The transfer and closing of the market will take place before December 2017.

The reality of the closing of the market – and the apparent likelihood that there is no replacement facility on the horizon – has started to sink in among those who have always relied on the flower exchange.  One highly regarded North Shore floral designer mused about the situation during a floral demonstration last week.  His favorite wholesaler – one who has always found just the right blooms for demanding clients – is contemplating retiring rather than relocating; a devastating change that would add an unwanted, new layer of complexity to what is already a demanding business.

I think about the fifty-plus amateur designers who enter the competition at the Boston Flower & Garden Show on each of its two entry days in March.  They receive no compensation for their design; only a ribbon or two.  To earn that ribbon, they’ll spend many hours (sometimes several dozen), creating a unique design at home.  Then, the day before they enter their design in competition, they converge on the flower market between 5 and 6 a.m. where they’ll spend an hour or more searching out the perfect blooms among several wholesalers.  Those flowers will go back home where the designers will take a day to ‘condition’ them.  The following morning, those same designers will descend on the Seaport World Trade Center at 5:30 a.m. to create their masterpieces.  All for a ribbon and the satisfaction of having created something beautiful for others to admire.

That frenzy of competition is replicated across half a dozen other ‘major’ shows across the region each year (Topsfield, Marshfield, Barnstable), plus several dozen club shows where the more ambitious designers eschew supermarket flowers in favor of those from the flower exchange.

A change is coming.  An end of an era.  This is one case where the future – at least for floral designers – may not be as bright as the present.

Revisiting the Scene of the Crime

Yesterday I revisited the scene of an imaginary crime and, in the process, committed an actual one.  Herein lies that story.

My fictional 'Brookfield Fair' looks a lot like
the very real Topsfield Fair

Anyone who has seen a map of the Topsfield Fair will immediately note a striking resemblance to the map of the fictional “Brookfield Fair” that appears on the flyleaf of The Garden Club Gang.  Further, anyone who has heard my ‘Gardening Is Murder’ presentation knows the circumstances under which that venerable annual event came to be the inspiration for the story of a heist that doesn’t go quite the way it was planned.

For those who don’t know the story behind the story, a brief synopsis:  The Topsfield Fair has, among its many attractions, a flower show sponsored by the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts.  My wife, Betty, is a floral designer who periodically enters such competitions.  Once you have signed up to design at the Fair, you also are making a commitment to be at the Fairgrounds at the ungodly hour of 7 a.m., where you have two hours to create your design.

Medfield is 52 miles from Topsfield and the only sane route from Point A to Point B is the insane circumferential highway known variously as Route 128, I-95, and the Yankee Division Highway.  Rush hour on that particular roadway begins at 5 a.m. (I promise I am not making this up) and so, to be at the Fairgrounds by 7, you need to leave Medfield before 6 a.m.  And, to arrive there without the residual urge to strangle anyone driving a gray Honda Accord, you need someone to drive you.

Even at 6 a.m., Route 128
is not for the faint of heart

And so, on a morning seven or eight years ago, I did my Loving Spouse Duty and drove Betty to Topsfield.  Unfortunately, once she was ensconced in front of her pedestal to begin her design, my presence became distracting and she bluntly let me know that I should go somewhere else for the duration.  Where I went was out in front of the Flowers Building (yes, the Flower Show has its own barn-like building which also houses horticulture and mini-landscape exhibits).  Close by were two other features: the Fair Administration Building and the Fair’s Main Gate.  I thought it mildly interesting that the three landmarks made a tight little cluster.

Then, the ‘Aha’ moment occurred.  An armored truck pulled into the main gate, went around a little traffic circle, and stopped in front of the Administration Building.  Two men jumped out of the truck, walked into the building, then came back out in under thirty seconds carrying a pair of enormous saddlebags.  The bags went into the truck, and the truck pulled out of the Fairgrounds.  Elapsed time:  perhaps ninety seconds.  I realized the truck had likely just picked up the Fair’s daily gate proceeds. 

And then it hit me that I was in the last bastion of the cash economy.  In a world where debit and credit cards have replaced cash in our wallets, places like the Topsfield Fair continue to be ones where we peel off twenty-dollar bills.  In that moment was born the plot of The Garden Club Gang in which four ‘little old ladies’ will pull off the feat of robbing that truck in broad daylight (yet with no witnesses), leaving behind no clues, and injuring no one.

Well, yesterday morning Betty was again entered at the Topsfield Fair and, once again, I was her designated driver.  But things have changed in the intervening years.  I have gotten to know many of the designers who form the core of the amateur competitions (they are ‘amateurs’ in name only).  Further, I spent three years as Chairman of Blooms! at the Boston Flower and Garden Show, where I learned the intricacies of how these competitions operate (knowledge I put on display in A Murder at the Flower Show and Murder in Negative Space).  Instead of wandering the fairgrounds, I stopped to chat with the flower show staff.  Moreover, taking a cue from one of my most useful activity as Chairman of Blooms!, I helped designers carry in cartloads of flowers from their cars.

Betty's design captured
the essence of Connecticut

Most designers were at their work places by 7.  A few had already completed their arrangements by 7:45.  But there were still a few open spaces.  These late arrivers would have to work quickly.  I saw one of those late arrivers struggling to bring in a cart and armload of flowers.  Her name was Rita, and she is a very nice lady.  I immediately rushed over to help her.  I swept up her cart and carried it into the building, following her instructions about which station was hers.  I placed the cart in the proper location, feeling very proud of myself. 

Which was when I got my foot caught in a basket.

There are moments in your life that will endure forever in memory.  This was one of them.  I did not see the basket; I knew only that I was inexplicably falling down.  And so I grabbed for something to keep me upright.  The ‘something’ that I grabbed was a pedestal on which rested the completed floral design of one Bonni Dinneen.

I did not know this at the time.  Nor did I know I had simultaneously jostled yet another pedestal.  All I knew was that I was being drenched in water and covered with croton leaves.  From start to finish, my pratfall lasted perhaps two seconds.  To me, it lasted an eternity. 

I had just ruined someone’s entry.

In seconds, I was surrounded by women asking me if I was all right.  Physically, I was fine.  A little wet perhaps but none the worse for wear.  What I was, was mortified.  This was the thing Betty had been admonishing me about for more than a decade:  stay away from the designers – they don’t have time for chit-chat.  And, for heaven’s sake, don’t ever get near any of the designs…

I slinked out of the Flowers Building and sat in my car.  As I was doing my slinking, I heard people asking if Bonni was still in the building and heard that, yes, she was still somewhere nearby.  I did not have the courage to face her, nor anyone else.  This was my ‘You’ll-shoot-your-eye-out’ moment.  Oh. My. God.

Early in the afternoon, the judging results were emailed to the entrants.  Betty received a 90+ Red for her Connecticut door hanging.  A 90+ Red is a big deal.  It means you got second place, but your design was good enough that it could have won a Blue (first), except that someone else’s entry was just a skosh better. 

Bonni's reconstructed design
received a Blue!

Oh, and Bonni Dinneen’s entry in a different category won a Blue.  And, no, it wasn’t a ‘we’re-so-sorry-for-what-happened’ gesture for my clumsiness.  The judges don’t show up until 9 a.m. and they have no idea whose entries they are viewing, and they certainly have no idea that someone’s entry had to be re-done on the fly.

I sent Bonni a congratulatory note that also apologized for my causing such devastation.  This morning, I received the following reply:

I feel as though I owe you an apology.  As I saw it happen, all I could do was laugh.  It was a comedic episode played in slow motion, with my design splaying in all directions and you grappling for control, while the second pedestal was wiggling back in forth.  No one knew if the second stand would also topple.  It was truly funny to see.  I apologize that I laughed at your accident.  I had to walk away, my laughter was so pronounced; like watching someone slip on the ice, it was that funny.   

Please if you ever tell the story...  tell it with a light heart and without embarrassment.  I know I will, when I encourage others to pursue flower design.

Bonni, that’s just the way I’m telling it.

One Enchanted Evening

Turning 85 is a big deal for people.  For garden clubs, it’s a huge milestone.  Some clubs fold as soon as the founding group loses interest.  Many clubs ‘age out’ as community demographics change; younger would-be members take a look at the gray-haired ladies at meetings and go elsewhere.  When a club makes it to 85 it is a bona-fide, enduring institution.

Members of the Brockton Garden
Club at project site

Last evening I had the opportunity to be part of the Brockton Garden Club’s special 85^th anniversary celebration.  For the occasion, the club had invited elected officials, representatives of area civic groups and presidents of garden clubs in neighboring towns.  It was, to say the least, a Big Deal.

The Brockton Garden Club has a lot to be proud of.  For those reading this from outside the region, Brockton is a city roughly half-way between Boston and Providence.  It is an old city with many of the problems endemic to such communities.  The garden club there is neither insular nor aloof from the surrounding area.  It plants and maintains downtown sidewalk planters as well as city gardens and traffic islands.  It provides scholarships and camperships and, of note, established and maintains a memorial garden at the city’s public library.  It is, in short, going strong with major civic involvement credentials.

Tony Todesco

When you turn 85 and have that much to celebrate, you want to do something special and, last evening, the club brought in a Big Gun.  While the Brockton Garden Club is thought of as a horticultural group (aka "dirt gardeners"), they elected to invite in a speaker who is widely known for arranging flowers rather than for cultivating them.

An aside before I continue:  amateur floral design is a subject about which I write in this space occasionally but I have never attempted to put what goes in in Massachusetts into a larger perspective.  Let me correct that now.  Massachusetts, by common consent, has a major concentration of gifted creative designers; one of the larger groups in the country.  Some of those are “amateurs” in the same way that the U.S. Olympic basketball and hockey teams are amateurs.  They operate flower-related studios and businesses but, when they sign up for a show, they’re competing against other talented amateurs for nothing more than a ribbon and bragging rights.

One of Tony's designs

Tony Todesco is a legend within this already rarefied group.  While he does not strut his résumé, he is a Master Flower Show Judge and served as the chairman of the National Garden Club Flower Show Committee on New Design Development from 2001 to 2009.  He has developed five new design types that can be found in the NGC’s Handbook for Flower Shows.  He is currently one of a small, select group re-writing that handbook, which is the ‘bible’ for both novice and experienced designers.  As curriculum vitae go, this is high octane.  I first came to know Tony during my years as Chairman of Blooms! at the Boston Flower & Garden Show, where, when he wasn’t designing, he would be the lead judge for the ‘top awards’ panel.

... and another...

It takes one set of skills to be a top designer and another, very different set of skills to be a top judge.  It requires a completely different aptitude to stand up on front of a large group of people and create ‘wow’ designs without putting an audience to sleep.  Tony gets an Award of Excellence for showmanship in this last category.

A floral designer hired by a club is expected to put together four or five arrangements in about an hour, explaining what they’re doing as they go along.  Tony did seven stunning designs in about 70 minutes.  He made it look effortless.  And he told stories.

Stories are an integral part to winning over an audience during a floral design or container gardening demonstration.  They’re part of a ‘patter’ that both establishes a rapport with an audience and fills in the blank spaces that punctuate the execution of a design (you can only say, “I’m going to add some more plecanthus in the back to draw the eye to rear of the design” so many times before people doze off).

... and another.

But you can tell them about your cat named Montgomery and how he came to be named for your favorite wholesale flower supplier in Northborough, or that while he is a stray you took in, you gladly spent a thousand dollars to repair Montgomery’s chipped canine.  You can tell them about your thirty-something son who has come home to “take care of you” and refuses to get the hint that it’s way past time to get a place of his own.  You can regale your audience with tales of having purchased land in then-far-away Sudbury at the age of 18 for a pittance, and that your parents were convinced there were still raiding parties from the King Philip War lurking.  These were some of Tony’s stories, and they kept the audience’s attention: entertainment coupled with education.

It was a great evening made all the more memorable because the event commemorated a milestone for a worthy organization.  My lone regret?  I have to follow Tony as the Club’s speaker at its April meeting and, while I’m not doing floral designs, comparisons are inevitable.  I guess I'd better brush up my tales of my own T.R., another cat with expensive dental issues.