SPRY ARRANGEMENTS
Between the current recession and the high cost of cut flowers, many florists are relying on alternative plant materials to make up arrangements. Curly willow shows up in all the best places, along with ornamental cabbage, dried seed pods and interesting branches plucked from dormant shrubs and trees. Fruit–especially green apples, oranges and lemons–has escaped from the crisper drawer, only to reappear on the hall table in the company of some unlikely associates. Pomegranates had their moment in the sun at the turn of the millennium and have kept right on going. A few years ago, Martha Stewart coated some plump pomegranates with sparkly mica dust and pinned them to a holiday wreathe. High-end florists mount them on dowels and insert them into seasonal arrangements; decorators strew them at random over granite countertops.
All of this–the pomegranates, the lemons and even the dormant branches–would have amused Constance Spry (1886-1960). Spry, who was the spiritual godmother of Martha Stewart and all the other gracious living gurus, broke the rules of traditional flower arranging by using unconventional plant materials in unexpected ways. Her friend, English journalist Beverley Nichols, wrote of her, “When Constance first went out into the country lanes and gathered her faded leaves and her curious berries and her spectral branches, and when she proceeded to create from these unfamiliar ingredients designs of baroque beauty, she was writing a fragrant page of history.” Sadly, that page of history has long been turned, and Constance Spry is best known these days as the namesake of the first of David Austin’s English roses.
Constance Spry’s London was in the same situation as much of the rest of the world in 1929. The “Roaring Twenties” had given way to the stock market crash, and it was not the best time to open a new business, let along one that sold a luxury commodity like cut flowers. But Miss Spry opened for business, and, apparently sold lots of flowers to all the best people–or at least those of the best people who still had money. By the early 1930’s she was successful enough to open a school of flower arranging in the exclusive Mayfair district of London. Like any good modern celebrity, she wrote a successful book on the subject. Her fame grew steadily. In 1937 she took a stall at the Chelsea Flower Show, further enhancing her reputation.
Eventually, everyone who was anyone, from the Royal Family to lesser viscountesses to the mere noveaux riches, had their flowers “done” by Constance Spry. Ordinary people read her many books and emulated Spry’s techniques. Spry expanded her repertoire beyond flowers, advising and instructing the public on food, wine and gracious living. Not only did she create the flower arrangements for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, she concocted a special curried chicken salad for the coronation luncheon. By the time she died in 1960, Constance Spry was a bit like the monarchy itself–a British institution.
What made Constance Spry’s flower arrangements wonderful? First, they were both large and light. Spry believed that space itself was an important component of any arrangement, and she always allowed space between the flowers, branches and foliage. Tightly clustered, static compositions were for people with static imaginations, not Constance Spry.
Her choice of plant materials was singular. Then as now, some people had pronounced ideas about which flowers were suitable for gracious arrangements, and which were “common” and somehow not fit for any container other than a jelly jar on the kitchen counter. Spry expanded the flower arranger’s concept of “acceptable” plant material to encompass all kinds of things. Though her compositions were as contrived as those of any other florist, they included all kinds of found components. She combined the dead with the living, flowers with fruits and berries and the familiar with the exotic. Her arrangements were sometimes over the top, but they were never boring.
And that is what it is all about. If you are going to go to the expense of decorating your surroundings with something as ephemeral as plant material, then there is no reason not to do it in a way that you find interesting. A high end florist knows all kinds of tricks and has access to all manner of stems and blossoms, but you have access to something even more unique–your own sensibilities. So grab some of those seedpods that you forgot to cut off last summer’s lilies, or go to the store and harvest a big bag of pomegranates. Make your own kind of “flower” arrangement. If people compliment your creation, take all the credit. If people snicker when they see it, think of Constance Spry and carry on.