Daisy Alexander of Studio Islen on Floral Design, Storytelling and British-Grown Flowers

I’m Daisy. I started Studio Islen exactly a year ago, doing flowers for friends’ weddings. Since then I’ve branched out to also doing gift bouquets, flowers for events, film/photo shoots and installations. I’ve just moved into my first studio and I’m really excited to use this space to expand within my practice and explore the cross-over between floral design and other art practices.

My background is in fine art and theatre. I think I’ve always loved creating visual worlds that hold their own stories, drawing from real life whilst inventing spaces that feel other-worldly. I like to approach my floristry practice in this way. Islen is a made up word, but I think it sounds like a fictional place, maybe an island or a garden. I’m really excited by the ways that nature inspires all creative practices and I want to use Studio Islen as a platform that explores the dimensions of this, collaborating with makers and creators across all fields to shape new perspectives of what floral design can be.

Flowers are something my mum and grandparents have taught me so much about from a young age. Growing up my mum would always fill the house with flowers and my Grandpa grew the most incredible plants and flowers in his garden next-door to us. My grandmother was also the florist for the local church so I was lucky to always be surrounded by such attention to/care for nature and flowers. I spent most of lockdown unemployed living at my parents’, cutting flowers from their garden and drawing still lifes of them.

Throughout my twenties I did so many different jobs, and at twenty-seven decided I wanted to spend as much time as possible around flowers to learn the ropes of floristry. I was incredibly lucky to be hired by Bess after applying for an entry level role at Calluna in West London - the best retail florist in the city. I jumped in at the deep end as a total beginner into full time work and it really was the best way for me to learn fast. My two years at Calluna were so incredibly rich and important. I learnt so much from the most talented women and gained the confidence to start doing things on my own.

I’m really enjoying bringing narrative and storytelling into my practice. This summer I took part in a two part floral exhibition run by Flowers On The Edge. The brief was to create installations to celebrate seasonal, sustainable floral design using British grown flowers. Part one was a collaboration where we were paired with another florist to build a table-scape concept together. Collaborating with another designer was really exciting and new to me. Part two was an exhibition held in a beautiful gothic building, which I made a tarot card inspired installation for. It felt really freeing telling a story through flowers in a site specific way. I’d love to do more of this kind of work.

Collaborations like this are a rare opportunity to expand the way you think about and approach your work. Anything that brings the floristry/growing community together to learn from one another is interesting to me at the moment.

I usually start by following the flowers that currently really inspire and excite me, and trust in what I’m drawn to. So much of the job is about being creatively flexible and bending to other people’s visions/briefs whilst setting expectations of what is physically and seasonally possible. This creates perimeters to work within and from there, things can start to take shape.

Sourcing the ingredients and timing their arrival is probably the most important part. I find it the hardest bit of the process as so much can go wrong and things almost always change along the way. I try not to restrict myself too much to the outcome as often the surprises or things that go wrong end up making the final piece better than what I had planned for. The flowers are the stars of the show and have a way of guiding you themselves. I think that their final form ends up being the result of the attention, care and patience you’ve shown them along the way.

I’m still learning a lot about British growers and flower farmers in this country. It seems that the care that goes into growing has a similar result to the quality of the crop. I freelance weekly for Sorelle - a London based floristry studio - who grow all of their contract flowers on their farm in Dorset. Working daily with these amazing materials has taught me so much about the beauty of seasonality and the range of quality that is actually available from British farms.

I like to play around with using minimal flower types within my work, finding impactful aesthetics with stripped back combinations. I like simplicity and tonality offset against dramatic pops of contrasting colour.

Landscapes. Beaches and woodlands inspire me the most. I can always feel my mind opening in the quiet of these expansive places. Living and working in London I find myself taking photos of how nature finds its way in the city amongst the concrete and brick. I like collecting these snapshots of nature against textures of buildings, pavements and road signs as inspiration to come back to.

I’ve usually got a notebook on the go to scribble down drawings, lists, words and ideas. I go to a lot of art and photography exhibitions when I need to be inspired to challenge myself and think in new ways.

Flowers have taught me so much about going slowly and noticing. When you work with flowers you learn so much about the diversity of their needs / behaviours / unusual quirks and they all have their own timelines. I find slowing down and taking the time to really notice these things allows the work to feel more effortless as you create.

It’s really easy to rush through the days getting lost in the repetition and setting a fast pace but there’s so much to learn when you take time to really slow down and notice what the flowers actually need. This also grounds you back into your body, which I find makes it easier to then get into a flow state of working.

Probably to trust the process and stay inspired. You’re made to feel as a florist you hold loads of control but really you don’t. There’s a sweet spot of being intentional with what you are setting out to do, but also letting go of exceptions as the outcome can often surprise you. Sometimes things work out in ways you didn’t expect and it can be good to lean into that. Staying inspired allows you to pivot and find solutions whilst still honouring the process of your craft.

I’ve learnt that forcing things that aren’t working can create more problems for yourself. If you can keep following your instincts and trust the process, that’s when exciting accidents happen.