A year in flowers
Just a single flower can remind me of a whole garden or a few papery leaves, an autumn wood.’ Shane Connolly’s design philosophy is rooted in artlessness, simplicity, bringing nature indoors and observing the changing cycle of the seasons. Surprisingly perhaps for a florist, he believes that ‘flowers should be allowed to arrange themselves’. 
Connolly takes a painterly approach to his arrangements
Appointed Royal Warrant holder to HRH the Prince of Wales in 2006, Connolly achieved worldwide fame in 2011 when the Duchess of Cambridge commissioned him to design the flowers for her wedding in Westminster Abbey. Wedding guests and the two billion or more people estimated to have watched the event on television, marvelled at the avenue of English field maples and hornbeams, underplanted with lily of the valley, in huge planters made by craftsmen at Highgrove.
The inspiration for this was the Gothic vaulted ceiling of the Abbey, which is modelled on the canopies of trees. In the abbey also were banks of seasonal foliage and flowers – azalea, rhododendron, lilac, Solomon’s seal euphorbia, beech and wisteria. Influenced by the language of flowers and their symbolism, Connolly used lily of the valley, meaning ‘return of happiness’ and ‘you have made my life complete’, Sweet William for gallantry, and myrtle, symbolising marriage and love, for the bride’s bouquet.
In his magnificent new book, A Year In Flowers, Shane Connolly shows how to use plants and flowers to light up interiors and surround us with the seasonal joys of nature. The book is written simply but eloquently and has the most stunning photographs by Jason Lowe. It begins with spring, with the first boughs of blossom and young camellia plants full of buds, which slowly, sometimes, infuriatingly slowly, he writes, unfurl indoors. The right container – an old chemist’s jar for a single tulip, a modern white glass planter for a Saxifraga ‘Green Ice’ – is essential and he collects bowls, jars, bottles and jugs at car-boot sales and junk shops. Glass pickle jars, he says, are perfect for the country garden posy.
Garden plants are often sold in full flower. Connolly likes to have them indoors for a week or so before planting them permanently outside. A few pots of snake’s head fritillaries (Fritillaria meleagris) in an old copper container beautifully illustrate this principle. Sustainability and a love of nature infuse his designs. Flowering crab apples, for example, lining the aisle in a small country church, can be replanted after the wedding as a life-long reminder of the day.
Left: The small autumn wedding bouquet features gardenias, scented jasmine and white snowberries; Right: Connolly has found a simple way to add several more shades to his design palette by placing tulips in old chemist's jars filled with water
‘Summer flowers,’ he writes, ‘have a glorious voluptuousness that is almost overwhelming.’ His greatest affection is for the rose – ‘the incarnation of summertime itself’. He prefers garden roses, although they have a shorter life, than anything mass-produced. Sweet peas, arranged in coloured glass tumblers on a windowsill, take him straight back to childhood. They are ‘homely yet delicate country flowers and need no lavish adornment’.
It was on an autumn day in 1987 that Connolly began his full-time career with flowers at Pulbrook & Gould. He learnt there that exuberant colour is not the only attribute of autumn; there are also the gentle colours of fading hydrangeas, the milk white of snowberries, the parchment shades of mushrooms and the papery browns and buffs of hornbeam and beech. Autumn, he writes, demands a painterly approach, with fruit, flowers and foliage creating an Old Master- like effect on an antique table.
It is in winter, I think, that Connolly’s reverence for nature makes for the loveliest of arrangements – the single flower or magical first branch of winter-flowering blossom displayed as a botanical specimen, the austere Christmas decoration consisting of a skeletal leaf touched with gold or a lichen-encrusted branch with a single sparkling ornament. The still life created from a few pots of snowdrops, with natural ‘props’, such as moss, dead rose twigs and some ivy, epitomises his masterly touch. This is a book of great and simple beauty that enhances the reader’s love of plants and flowers, indoors and out, and provides inspiration on how to bring nature and the seasons into our homes.
A Year In Flowers by Shane Connolly, with photography by Jason Lowe, is published by Clearview Books, priced £30: www.clearviewbooks.com
Connolly takes a painterly approach to his arrangementsAppointed Royal Warrant holder to HRH the Prince of Wales in 2006, Connolly achieved worldwide fame in 2011 when the Duchess of Cambridge commissioned him to design the flowers for her wedding in Westminster Abbey. Wedding guests and the two billion or more people estimated to have watched the event on television, marvelled at the avenue of English field maples and hornbeams, underplanted with lily of the valley, in huge planters made by craftsmen at Highgrove.
The inspiration for this was the Gothic vaulted ceiling of the Abbey, which is modelled on the canopies of trees. In the abbey also were banks of seasonal foliage and flowers – azalea, rhododendron, lilac, Solomon’s seal euphorbia, beech and wisteria. Influenced by the language of flowers and their symbolism, Connolly used lily of the valley, meaning ‘return of happiness’ and ‘you have made my life complete’, Sweet William for gallantry, and myrtle, symbolising marriage and love, for the bride’s bouquet.
In his magnificent new book, A Year In Flowers, Shane Connolly shows how to use plants and flowers to light up interiors and surround us with the seasonal joys of nature. The book is written simply but eloquently and has the most stunning photographs by Jason Lowe. It begins with spring, with the first boughs of blossom and young camellia plants full of buds, which slowly, sometimes, infuriatingly slowly, he writes, unfurl indoors. The right container – an old chemist’s jar for a single tulip, a modern white glass planter for a Saxifraga ‘Green Ice’ – is essential and he collects bowls, jars, bottles and jugs at car-boot sales and junk shops. Glass pickle jars, he says, are perfect for the country garden posy.
Garden plants are often sold in full flower. Connolly likes to have them indoors for a week or so before planting them permanently outside. A few pots of snake’s head fritillaries (Fritillaria meleagris) in an old copper container beautifully illustrate this principle. Sustainability and a love of nature infuse his designs. Flowering crab apples, for example, lining the aisle in a small country church, can be replanted after the wedding as a life-long reminder of the day.
Left: The small autumn wedding bouquet features gardenias, scented jasmine and white snowberries; Right: Connolly has found a simple way to add several more shades to his design palette by placing tulips in old chemist's jars filled with water‘Summer flowers,’ he writes, ‘have a glorious voluptuousness that is almost overwhelming.’ His greatest affection is for the rose – ‘the incarnation of summertime itself’. He prefers garden roses, although they have a shorter life, than anything mass-produced. Sweet peas, arranged in coloured glass tumblers on a windowsill, take him straight back to childhood. They are ‘homely yet delicate country flowers and need no lavish adornment’.
It was on an autumn day in 1987 that Connolly began his full-time career with flowers at Pulbrook & Gould. He learnt there that exuberant colour is not the only attribute of autumn; there are also the gentle colours of fading hydrangeas, the milk white of snowberries, the parchment shades of mushrooms and the papery browns and buffs of hornbeam and beech. Autumn, he writes, demands a painterly approach, with fruit, flowers and foliage creating an Old Master- like effect on an antique table.
It is in winter, I think, that Connolly’s reverence for nature makes for the loveliest of arrangements – the single flower or magical first branch of winter-flowering blossom displayed as a botanical specimen, the austere Christmas decoration consisting of a skeletal leaf touched with gold or a lichen-encrusted branch with a single sparkling ornament. The still life created from a few pots of snowdrops, with natural ‘props’, such as moss, dead rose twigs and some ivy, epitomises his masterly touch. This is a book of great and simple beauty that enhances the reader’s love of plants and flowers, indoors and out, and provides inspiration on how to bring nature and the seasons into our homes.
A Year In Flowers by Shane Connolly, with photography by Jason Lowe, is published by Clearview Books, priced £30: www.clearviewbooks.com