With Summer now here in all its glory, it is time to start thinking about how you can bring a bit of sunshine into your homes and create a bright and colourful spectacle. This year a few flowers in a vase are not going to cut the mustard. It's time to let your imagination run wild and embrace this year's latest home design trend: Garden of Delight. But what exactly does this mean? Well it's a unique combination of vibrant flowers and unusual objet d’art that will compliment the season's finest shades. Antlers and feathers are the way to inject some otherworldly opulence into your beautiful arrangements.

The flowers that best create this exotic Garden of Delight are all striking in their shapes and colours. Some of the finest examples include the Bird of Paradise, Gerbera, Flame Lily, Vanda Orchid, Curcuma and Carnation, which will all inject a burst of summer into your living room. Bring some Siam seduction in the form of Curcuma to recreate high style from the Himalayas. The Carnation, often thought of as an everyday flower, is the star of this fairytale fantasy! With its intense colour, huge frilly flowers, and long vase life of up to three weeks, it is ideal for any flower arrangement! It’s easy to get your hands on flowers from all parts of the globe so you too can have your very own Garden of Delight from within the confines of your own home.

Have you ever thought of combining flowers with colourful or fairytale foliage? It’s easy to create a Summer wonderland using natural objects such as feathers and silken materials, which will make your flower displays the talk of the town.

Andrea Caldecourt from The Flowers and Plants Association joins us live online on Friday 22nd June 2007 at 14:30 to show how we can create our “Garden of Delight” this Summer.

H: Jane Constantinis, Host
A: Andrea Caldecourt, Flowers and Plants Association

H: Hello and welcome to the Lifestyle Show, bought to you by the Flowers and Plants Association. I’m Jane Constantinis. Now winter is well and truly behind us and most of us are beginning to think about our summer holidays, and there’s never been a better time to start also thinking about flowers. Now perhaps your office or home environment could benefit from an injection of flowers, perhaps you’re a romantic guy looking to impress the love of your life, or perhaps you’ve had a really bad week, and you just want a way to give yourself a really wonderful treat. It doesn’t matter, whatever the reason, there’s never been a better moment to explore this season’s crop of flowers, and I’m joined in the studio by Andrea Caldecourt, who’s an expert in all things bright and beautiful –

A: Thank you very much

H: Thanks for coming in and bringing all these beautiful flowers. What is it about flowers that makes them so special?

A: I don’t know what it is but it definitely is something because all the independent surveys and research that have been done say that flowers are the most preferred gift over things like jewellery or champagne or even tickets to the theatre, something like 70% of respondents from a recent survey said if they were to be given a gift they’d want flowers. We do surveys on what makes you most happy when you buy stuff for yourself. Flowers come up really high. There’s something about getting in touch with nature, maybe, the bright colours. The fact that you can watch them change so you can buy for instance lilies, and you’ve got them in tight bud and you watch them open up and there’s that enjoyment of something moving and changing which you don’t get with say a vase or an ornament or something like that

H: They’re not just good for the eye, they seem to be good for the spirit as well –

A: And you’ve also got with a lot of them, fragrance, so just the smell of the flowers can cheer you up as well

H: Wonderful. Of course as usual it’s an interactive show, we want to hear from you, so type your question or your comment in the box, send it to us and we’ll get through as many as we can in the course of the show. Now you’ve brought some fabulous examples of flowers along. Will you just talk us through them one by one and give us a little bit of an insight into where it comes from and how it’s grown and so on?

A: The flowers we’ve got with us today are relating to our fashion trend for summer, Garden of Delight – every quarter, every season, the Flowers and Plants Association has a new fashion trend, so in the same way that the catwalk does, or interiors do, we look at something which is a fashion for that season with flowers, and Garden of Delight is a very tropical, jungly, exotic feel with lots of bright, zingy colours. Fits in really well with what’s happening in interiors, and also what’s happening on the catwalk, we’re all dressing a lot more brightly, there’s a lot more colours coming in, and it’s quite a fun trend, so you can add little, quirky things and you’ll see those as we go through. I’m going to start with this absolute beauty over here which is a Vanda orchid

H: Fabulous isn’t it?

A: Now a lot of people might know the phalaenopsis or moth orchid, because you get those in the supermarkets or market stalls, they’re quite common now, you see them around in the florists – sort of two stems often like that, branching off with the white flowers

H: Yes

A: This is a vandal orchid, slightly more exotic but definitely worth tracking down. They last for ages, it’s got these lovely little freckly faces on them on the orchids. This one’s displayed in a big vase, and it gives it a sort of microclimate, so providing you spray inside the vase every day, or put maybe an inch of water in the bottom, the steam or humidity can rise up inside the vase and keep it happy. The Vanda will come from areas of northern India, the Himalayas, Burma – the tropical jungles of the Far East, so if you can get something which comes close to that, bathrooms are great because they’re usually hot and steamy, sometimes kitchens as well if you don’t have too hot a kitchen, and it will love it in there, as long as it’s got enough moisture it will be happy as Larry.

H: And I’m instinctively thinking that’s going to be very expensive – is it?

A: Yes it will, but an orchid on a plant will flower for 6 weeks or more, and will re-flower again, so you know in a couple of months time when it’s had a rest and it’s feeling happy, often they start flowering again. I’ve had a cut orchid in my bathroom now for 2 ½ weeks and it shows no sign of decaying or dying – or – one of the lowest flowers has dropped off, but the others are still opening up in buds so they look expensive but they’re such good value that one stem of that can give you so much flower

H: Wonderful. We’ve got a piece of VT to illustrate how some people are using flowers in really imaginative ways – shall we just have a look at that?

A: Yes that’s fine

Video footage

H: Great. Amazing what people can – how imaginative people can be. Just let’s touch for a second, because I’m not at all imaginative with arranging, and I keep meaning to go to a class and learn really fundamental tips about how to create something like this –

A: At the Flowers and Plants Association we try and make things simple, we say that you don’t need special techniques to enjoy flowers in the home, it can be quite straightforward. But something like this vase of gerbera, really quite easy. We’ve got some bamboo canes here that have got a hole up the middle, and we’ve dropped the stem down the centre, we’ve added some coloured sticks in and the stalks from extra gerbera that we’ve used from another arrangement. Took about 5 minutes to do. Very straightforward, doesn’t require any special skill or creative ability. Our new website tryflowers.org.uk has 81 simple, basic, fun ideas. They’re fashionable, they’re stylish, they’re fun. They’re not triangles rigidly – we don’t believe in that kind of flower arranging for the general public, it’s too difficult, but we like to make it something that you can enjoy in your home, on your desk at work or give to a friend

H: Yes. I mean there’s such a variety here, it’s like anything goes. You can just use your imagination.

A: Yes.

H: Talk us through – what’s the next flower that you’ve bought in for us –

A: The next beauty is this one here which is botanically called Strelitzia, after a Hanovarian Princess I believe –

H: Yes

A: But more commonly known as Bird of Paradise, and it’s got that bird look, it’s got a beaky kind of face to it –

H: Yes

A: These are wonderful, they come in really tight, in tight beaks and then they slowly open out

H: Gorgeous

A: And once this top flower has died back, you can just pull it out of the beak and another one will pop up

H: Oh

A: There’s a whole set of them lying in here and they just kind of fan round

H: Fantastic

A: These are from South Africa originally, they’re grown all around the world now

H: While we’re just looking at that one, very exotic, let me ask you this question that’s come in from Michelle. She suffers from hay fever – which plants would you suggest she buys to still bring some colour into the home? Are some much worse than others?

A: Most hay fever is caused by grass pollen or tree pollen, anything that’s carried on the wind. So a lot of flowers are fine for hay fever sufferers because they’re pollinated by insects, or they’re pollinated by making new bulbs, they don’t actually rely on outside influences to help make new plants. If she wants plants in the home, any green foliage plants are fine, and if she wants a bit more colour, there’s – paradoxically – green foliage plants that have coloured leaves, so things like a begonia rex would have big exotic purply, pinky or striped white leaves, so you can get some colour into your home with plants, without having to have them as flowering plants if you’ve got a really problem with hay fever. As well the breeders have noticed this problem and have addressed it, particularly with sunflowers and lilies, you can actually buy pollen-free varieties and they’ll be flagged up as such. And most of the commercially available sunflower varieties are now pollen-free and you can certainly ask for pollen-free lily varieties as well

H: Ok, fantastic. So back to our exotic South African – and what are the blue ones that you’ve put in with those?

A: These are a type of delphinium but they’re a nice, spriggy, open delphinium, and they’re often called Blue Bee in the florists because that’s a variety name. There’s another variety name Volcafreedom, but that’s a bit more complicated and most florists like to stick with Blue Bee, and it’s got a very open, airy atmosphere to it and it’s got that really intense blue which you hardly ever get in natural flowers, so it’s a really valuable flower

H: And where are they from originally?

A: Delphiniums will be from central Asia, central Europe, that sort of area. But now they’re coming in from Holland, they’re grown in the UK as well. Anywhere where it’s got a fairly temperate climate

H: Chloe has sent a question in. I think we all suffer from this. She says that the flowers she buys seem to die very quickly.

A: Right

H: What can she do to prolong their life? Somebody recommended, I’ve heard this too – to put lemonade or an aspirin in the water

A: Whoever that somebody is, I’m coming round their house and having to slap the back of their legs. It won’t help! Lemonade will introduce a lot of sugar and bacteria into the water

H: Where’s this come from then, because I’ve hard that too

A: Yes, old wives’ tales, terrible. Flowers.org.uk on the home page has a button called “care tips” and you can click through and get a step-by-step - but briefly – if you get flowers, cut the stems at an angle, strip all the leaves that are going to be below the water line, pristine clean vases and fresh, clean water. And then you add the flower food which is proven over 75 years of testing and vase life trials and so on to actually to be relevant to a flower and what its needs are, the lemonade will make your water go smelly and introduce bacteria. Aspirin will do absolutely nothing unless your flowers have a headache and they probably don’t. Nor will dropping a penny in. Try not to abuse your flowers, please. Do not go bashing the ends of the stems, or crushing them

H: I do that

A: Or sticking them with pins, or any other kind of torture for them. Just treat them nicely and they will be fine. If you can keep them somewhere cool they tend to last longer.

H: Spraying – spraying them?

A: On the whole don’t tend to need it. If you keep them away from sunny windows or on top of the radiator or anything like that, put them somewhere cool and they should be fine

H: And what about changing the water after a little while?

A: Yes, some flowers are worse than others at making stinky water, I have to say

H: It really is stinky as well, when you empty it

A: Usually once a week is fine, and if you made sure everything is clean beforehand then that’s fine. Chrysanthemums tend to be a little bit more difficult. Every 3 or 4 days would be good for them just to wash it out, make sure it’s clean, put it back in fresh water

H: Lovely, thank you. Josephine has got a lovely question

A: Oh good

H: Because she’s having a summer wedding

A: Congratulations

H: Can’t decide which flowers to use! Goodness me, so much choice – where do you begin?

A: Well the Garden of Delight trend is lovely, but maybe a bit exotic if you’re having a coloured theme as well, which people do for their wedding. We actually have a link on flowers.org.uk that’s labelled “weddings”

H: Oh fantastic

A: And it takes you through what’s available for the month you’re getting married, flowers in particular colours if you want to match up to your theme, and flowers with scents because people do like scents. We’ve found most people do tend to like green and white, or pale pink, sort of pastelly colours. And there’s a huge range, and if you’re getting married in the summer you’re spoilt for choice

H: Go on, take a punt, pick two – two of your favourites?

A: I think white lilies are always a classic for a wedding, so either the Oriental or the Longeflorum lily, always a classic. Also the curcuma is very unusual for a bouquet if you wanted something different. We’ve got the white one here, there’s also a pink one in the arrangement in the corner, and that’s quite a sort of a different shape, and most people won’t have seen that before, so if you’re looking for something –

H: A little bit out of the ordinary

A: Yes, something different, that might be an idea to choose

H: Ok thank you for that. Hazel wants to know if she can put flowers in the bathroom?

A: Yes, go ahead

H: She wants to brighten up the bathroom

A: Yes, I always do in my flat. It’s a tiny little flat, the bathroom is a good place to put them, I’m in there twice a day minimum so –

H: We don’t want to hear about your personal habits –

A: Yes at least you’re guaranteed to see the flowers. If they’re in the living room I may not get that far on a busy day, but I know that if they’re in the bathroom, and if you’re relaxing in the bath it’s nice to look at some beautiful flowers, so yes

H: And you were saying that orchids in particular would like that bathroom environment because of the steam

A: Yes orchid plants would love the bathroom, yes

H: Any others that would really thrive in there?

A: Yes, a lot of foliage plants like it, particularly ferns because it’s nice and moist in the air. They tend not to need the moisture at the roots, they tend to need it at the leaves so a lot of green foliage plants –

H: I suppose if you think about where they grow in their natural habitat –

A: Exactly

H: You can try to match that in your home can’t you?

A: That’s the optimum, yes

H: We can’t live in a rainforest obviously, but we can do our best. Shall we have another look at some ways that people have used flowers imaginatively?

A: Get some inspiration, yes

H: Let’s have a look

Video footage

H: Welcome back, you’re watching the Lifestyle Show brought to you by the Flowers and Plants Association. Just caught us mid-chat there. Don’t forget it’s live and interactive, we want to hear your questions so type them in the box below the screen and do send them with your name, we’ll get through as many as we can in the show. Talk us through your next favourite plant

A: Ok if we move to this vase at the back here, it’s a lovely shape purple vase. People who’ve seen the vintage glamour webchat may recognise the vase and feathers, which shows you, you don’t need too many products, we can ring the changes – bring that vase out again and we’ll have a summer arrangement in it. We’ve got the pink curcuma which we were discussing before, this is this one. It’s actually related to turmeric the spice – the roots of the curcuma – relative of that they use to make spice –

H: How interesting

A: And grind it down. We’ve also got in with it some more kind of cottage garden flowers –

H: Yes yes

A: And that’s kind of the mix of the trend to mix the exotic and the familiar, so we’ve got phlox flowers which some people may know if they’re growing on their allotment, or old-fashioned gardens –

H: Yes

A: And we’ve also got these, aconitum, commonly called monksford, because it has like a little hood shape to the flower, and it’s a nice, dark, purply-blue colour. Comes in various shades of sky, from night time to day time. The thing you need to watch with this is it can be poisonous. So wash your hands carefully after using, don’t let your kids eat it- not that they should be eating any flowers anyway but –

H: Well no

A: But sometimes little babies might have a pull –

H: Exactly

A: So just be aware it’s for adults only!

H: I must say this colour palette is my particular favourite

A: Yes

H: I think the purples and the mauves are wonderful aren’t they?

A: And you can’t go wrong with mixing them as well, sort of any kind of tones of purple and pink and blue all combine really happily together, so it doesn’t require a lot of colour sense

H: Yes. You know we were talking at the very beginning of the show, in my introduction, about if you’re a romantic bloke looking to impress –

A: Where are you? Ring this number now!

H: What sort of flowers would you recommend to give to really impress a woman? Obviously it depends on the woman

A: It depends on the woman, and that’s the first thing actually. Find out enough about her that you know what her tastes are, because that always shows you’ve done your homework. Not too much in a creepy, stalking way but you know “oh I know that you like yellow” for instance – that’s always a good thing

H: I’ve seen it in your house – Yes that’s not good too much.

A: And we do know from our own surveys that people fill in on our website, that women find a dozen red roses a bit cheesy and lacking in imagination, so I would – you know red roses are fine, but if that’s your kind of wooing technique, you might want to – you know – pep it up a bit. Click on our website for a few ideas

H: I think particularly around Valentines, the red roses –

A: Yes

H: You see guys, don’t you on Valentines night walking home from the tube or whatever with their dozen red roses, for which they’ve paid an astronomical amount of money and you think oh, poor souls –

A: Because they’ve left it to the last minute and –

H: Exactly

A: Yes, so seasonal is always good, and on the website, flowers.org.uk there’s seasonal tips for what’s in season, and certainly in spring tulips and daffodils and narcissi are great and fragrant, and in the autumn things like bloom chrysanthemums, which are the really big blousy heads

H: Oh yes

A: They’re great; yes look around for what seems to be having a short season. In the summer peonies will definitely impress –

H: Oh yes, fabulous

A: I don’t know a woman, who doesn’t like peonies, have never met one yet so –

H: And of course it’s not just flowers that we’re talking about, plants too and in fact Richard wants to know “what are the best plants to have in the home at the moment?”

A: There are great plants to have in the home that actually cleanse the air, so particularly if you’ve moved into a new house or you’ve just redecorated, there’s a whole bank of healthy house plants, we call them that absorb chemicals from the air

H: Gosh

A: And this isn’t just our kind of new age hippiness, NASA laboratories tested it, so they sent plants up into space and tested them in contained capsules to see – they pumped in things like formaldehyde, benzene from cigarettes from car exhausts, really nasty chemicals, and they put a plant in and they saw how quickly it actually absorbed –

H: That’s amazing, they did that research for you – you’ve got friends in very high places?

A: Oh yes, we know them! Yes Dr Bill Wolverton did the research, and things like pot chrysanthemums, spider plants, peace lilies, so they’re not difficult plants to get hold of, they’re not difficult plants to look after, they’re not expensive but they do a great job in making us feel better

H: And of course one thing that sometimes – or you think may be happening when you’ve got flowers and plants in your house is that you’re attracting more, well Jonas thinks that he’s attracting flies and mosquitoes –

A: Has he tried washing more often, maybe that’s it? No

H: Could be that couldn’t it? Are there any plants or flowers which deter these creatures?

A: Not as far as I know but the best thing for deterring them is a citronella candle. So if you’ve got all the windows open and you don’t have a mesh screen and you’re finding the bugs come in, light a citronella candle

H: Yes, or turn the lights out

A: Yes

H: In the dark

A: But certainly if you’ve got fragrant flowers and you’re leaving all the windows open they’re bound to want to come and have a little explore

H: Yes, yes. And we haven’t really talked about this beautiful plant, can you just tell us what that one is in detail?

A: Yes, it’s a little sundae dish, so everyone’s got something similar in terms of you know a vase or a little bowl for ice cream or whatever –

H: Is it alright on Mondays too?

A: Yes, any day of the week! Every day – we’ve put in some oasis, some flower foam. Now normally this is green but you can get coloured oasis now which is really helpful because if you can’t cover up very carefully it doesn’t matter because this is yellow and it matches. And we’ve just stuck in some gloriosa lilies which I absolutely love. I’m just going to move this out of the way because they’re just so absolutely fabulous – they’re like a kind of –

H: They’re amazing

A: They’re like a bird, a tropical butterfly, I’m not sure. They’re sometimes called flame lily, and you can see why, they look just like a flame

H: Very unusual shape isn’t it?

A: Yes and they are the national flower of Zimbabwee, and they cling, they climb up and they cling by the ends of their leaves, so they have little tendrils off the ends of their leaves and they cling on, and we’ve put those above some green carnations

H: Wonderful. I’m afraid we’ve run out of time, would you believe it’s gone so quickly, we could go on forever. Thank you very much for bringing in all these wonderful flowers and explaining about them to us. If you want to know more then go to flowers.org.uk or tryflowers.org.uk. I hope you’re inspired, I certainly am – thank you very much for joining us, see you again soon. Bye

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