Our Demonstrators  for the Octob er 2012 Club Meeting were Christine Hutchinson and Susie Marsh with their title ‘Mix and Match’.

Christine and Susie gave us a splendid evening with wonderful flowers and foliage.  They explained the processes of construction and conditioning of plant material as they demonstrated which was very informative.

• For their first arrangement, the demonstrators each did a horizontal arrangement simultaneously, using black cordyline, fatsia japonica, choisia,for foliage and placing liatris, Coolwater pink roses, and vibrant green Anastasia Chrisanthemum flowers across the arrangement.  To our delight, at the end these were turned into an upright position and looked amazing as they were placed one at each corner of the stage.
• Christine did the next arrangement entitled ‘World Wide Web’.  The mechanics of this were constructed out of a web of wire covered in wool and then placed in a mushroom shape with sticks covered in jute in an upright position.  Large sphagnum moss balls were placed on the foam with midelino sticks joined from the top curving to the centre and then down to the bottom.  Three orange gerbera were placed in test tubes flowing down from the top to make a stunning bright arrangement.
• Each demonstrator next made a hand tied bouquet using orange Amarilis, curled aspidistra leaves, palm and fatsia leaves.  These were encased in purple cellophane and tied with wool.
• Christine next demonstrated a theme from New Zealand using mechanics made from folded magazines to make a pot-like structure.  Susie made a smaller one to complement this.  Height was created with formium leaves skeletenised fatsia japonica and grey senecio.  An avalanche of white roses flowed down with liatris giving a strong line of purple.
• The ladies next made arrangements in two baskets which Christine had made at a basket workshop using small foliage leaves, and interweaving orange peppers, orange chrysanthemums, Chinese lanterns and golden rod to make lovely autumnal baskets.
• Susie demonstrated the last arrangement which was her test piece for her Demonstrator’s exam.  The arrangement was staged in a large boat shaped pot with a magnificent sail made from cornus and willow.  Decking was created with aspidistra leaves with juniper at the stern creating a sea-like movement.  Beautiful white Avalanche roses were hung in test tubes along the curving line of the top of the sail with white Tom Pierce roses rising in height from the deck to follow the curve of the sail.  Large white lilies were placed on the base as decking.  At the same time Christine created a flat arrangement to represent the sea with greys, greens and using the same flowers as Susie.