Floating flowers - Garden: Guide

Sunset, August, 2002 by Debra Lee Baldwin

* When floral designer Laurie Connable throws backyard parties, she transforms her swimming pool into a floating garden. Bunches of blooms, arranged in the centers of foam rings, glide silently over the water's surface.

For each bouquet, Connable uses two foam rings (one 10 inches in diameter, the other 12 inches). She gathers flat green leaves such as citrus or ivy (enough to cover the smaller ring), 8 to 10 fern fronds (leatherleaf is ideal, with stems 18 to 24 inches long), and longstemmed flowers like dahlias or roses. Five large dahlias and several clusters of roses, ageratum, and cranesbill geraniums are usually enough for one bouquet. "I also add a fine-leafed variegated ivy, which I leave long so it trails along the water," she says.

To make a bouquet, Connable places the smaller ring on the larger one, secures the two together with toothpicks, then sets the stacked rings in a bucket filled with water. She adds the citrus or ivy leaves first, arranging them around the top ring so that they overlap with tips downward, to conceal the foam. The larger ring, which will stay below the water's surface, remains uncovered.

Next, she inserts long-stemmed fern fronds through the center hole so that they cross underwater, forming a "frog" that will hold flower stems snugly Finally she adds the flowers.

Connable makes the bouquets a day in advance and stores them in water-filled buckets in cool shade.