A Bloomin' Beautiful Workshop At West Elm!

I'm taking more of a less-chat-more-visual tact today seeing as it's Friday and I wanted to share with you some snaps from my drop-in workshop I held at West Elm London a couple of weekends ago. With a hectic week in the run up spent cutting templates, petals and stamens I thought I might actually drown under a mountain of crepe, but I couldn't wait to see what my "students" would pull out of the bag...Armed with my kit full of beautiful paper and all the necessary accoutrements I spent a relaxed day teaching a fantastic group of mostly women (bar Hugh the barista who was rather gifted with his paper skills) the basics of crafting and creating flowers. We worked with a stock of sculptural florist's crepe and the slightly more delicate doublette paper which gives a beautiful, real look. Excuse the photos-they're all straight off my iPhone with no editing but the bright lighting in the store made the colours pop, and I liked that!So, with a cup of coffee in hand, we set to work stretching, twisting, binding, fringing and cupping our papers, working them to life in an explosion of gorgeous colour. You could also paint your petals or add in a smattering of glitter...Even the most timid of participants found their confidence and, with a little practice had the basics down in no time and everyone went home with something they'd made themselves. I hope they were inspired to go out and make some of their own later on too! Thank you to everyone who took the time to learn something new and show their support, especially Jeska Herne at Lobster & Swan (and my star pupil, her good friend Judith!) Julieta Lucca, a few very good friends and...my mum who came to surprise me-see what she made in the photo above.Oh, and the team at West Elm of course-you are the perfect hosts, as always!I'm thinking of running another one a little later in the year-I have plenty of left over paper! Do you think you'd like to come along if I did?.