Flowers for All: Modern Floral Arrangements for Beauty, Joy, and Mindfulness Every Day

Florist McLeary (The Art of Wearable Flowers) shares tips for decorating with blooms in this charming manual. Recounting how she fell in love with floral design after helping with the arrangements for a friend’s wedding, McLeary outlines how to create 30 simple projects that encourage readers to “see flowers and natural materials as accessible art supplies to be used to enrich our lives and enliven living spaces.” She advises on how to acquire flowers, suggesting that readers might grow their own or find them around the neighborhood and in wild brambles. The arrangements emphasize natural design, such as using tallow berry branches to prop up the “weak, fleshy stems” of hyacinths, or collecting herbs and other plants from “any available green space” and arraying them in a dish of water. Other arrangements include one inspired by an avocado (green Fritillaria persica, or Persian lily, in a black vase accented with foraged cherry blossoms and a cluster of green grapes) and an autumnal wreath formed from yarrow. McLeary sticks to her promise to keep things “simple and approachable,” and readers will be inspired to put to use the plants in their backyards and neighborhoods. This should be a no-brainer for novice florists. (Feb.)