Zbigniew Dziwulski: Everything happens for a reason

It was lilies that made me face the challenge of giving my best as a floral designer.

I love lilies. When I see them unfold before my eyes, my imagination immediately kicks in. And then I want only one thing, and that is to create some beautiful designs with these special flowers. This time I was lucky enough to be able to work with four extravagant and gorgeous varieties of them. Below you can see what I made of them.

"Everything has its reason" - that was the title of the show that took place during the Gardenia Fair in Poznan. As Florist of the Year 2021, I was invited by the Association of Polish Florists to act as a guest presenter during the event.

The show nicely summed up, as far as I was concerned, the activities I had undertaken in promoting flowers for almost a whole year, in my capacity as Florist of the Year. A short presentation was also given on stage, summarizing all the activities of the Association of Polish Florists over the past ten years.

The show was a good opportunity to present some flowers from Bredefleur, the Dutch grower of lilies. For the show I chose four varieties: the lilies Original Love, Dark Secret, Tintoretto and Apricot Fudge.

The show began with a bouquet arranged by hand, without auxiliary construction, for which lilies of the Dark Secret variety were used, flowers of a dark color, almost the color of chocolate. These stood out beautifully in the bouquet.

The color of the lilies was complemented by other flowers, such as cappuccino roses, carnations and large-flowered chrysanthemums. Together, these formed an ideal base to showcase the Dark Secret's beauty. The whole thing was finished off with the dried grasses of Miscanthus Sinensis Zebrinus.

Another example of a bouquet made during this show was one for which Tintoretto lilies were used. This garnered much admiration; people enjoyed it. Especially the distinct look of the buds and petals had a lot of attention. The bouquet was arranged as a spiral, for which an auxiliary structure had been used in the form of a wire ring. Attached to that was a number of lilies, along with some shoots of eucalyptus. In that bouquet, it was the long, smooth stems of the lilies that literally and figuratively stood out. That further emphasized the whole beautiful appearance.

The show was met with much applause, as it had once again confirmed how varied the use of lilies in floral design is.

For the composition with the large plate, I took lilies of the type Original Love. The arrangement had the Christmas theme as its base. It was placed on a piece of bio-stitch foam from Smithers-Oasis and executed in earthy tones with different shades of red, because of the intense red of these lilies.

Urszula Asanowicz and Krzysztof Zurek assisted at the show. Photos are by Marcin Czech.

Two days later a Christmas gala took place in Poznan's flower market where I had the opportunity to present a few more designs. The first of these featured the lily Apricot Fudge.

At this show I made a wedding bouquet in the shape of drops, for which I used Apricot Fudge. Each flower was hung separately from a gold wire attached to the handle of the bouquet. I sealed the ends of the stems with glue so as not to let too much water evaporate.

It was a light, movable bouquet that constantly changed shape as the flowers moved freely. The bouquet as a whole was completed with a pine branch painted in gold. The lily also caused a stir and garnered admiration, because of its appearance and because of its color. After the presentation, several people asked about the grower.

Krzysztof Zurek, Agnieszka Sekalska and Aleksandra Wilgocka assisted in the realization of this show. The photos are by Ewa Bentkowska.

Everything happens for a reason

"Everything has its reasons" was not simply the title of the Gardenia Fair in Poznan. It is also a motto that I truly believe in. I am fortunate that I get to work with the most beautiful of what the world produces and I can make people happy with it. That they experience more admiration, pleasure and interest when seeing such flowers. I myself am challenged to give the best of myself as soon as I have flowers around me.

I would like to thank the grower of the lilies, Bredefleur, the exporter Salaba and the wholesaler Rekpol for their support with the logistics and transportation of the flowers. And again also the site of Thursd, for the good cooperation and trust.

Zbigniew Dziwulski, florist and arranger, is the main representative of "Kwiaciarnia Grasz W Zielone?", a flower store in Lublin, Poland: "Out of love for flowers, because everything has its reasons. The most important thing in life is that you have to have a purpose and a passion. And then you have to live by that."