Book review: Wreaths

Wreaths: fresh foraged & dried floral arrangements

by Katie Smyth and Terri Chandler

Insider secrets on creating floral arrangements in your home with fresh and dried flowers, leaves and stems.

Never has dried honesty been so cool. Nor has crafting with natural materials. Cue the book Wreaths. Not just for Christmas, or doors, and no longer limited to spruce and cinnamon sticks, wreaths are having a moment; be they explosive asymmetrical summer arrangements billowing with cotoneaster foliage and cosmos or something organic for autumn featuring preserved beech leaves and poppy pods.

Authors Katie Smyth and Terri Chandler of WORM London, who run a trendy flower studio, picked up ideas from different cultures as they travelled the world and show us how to create the spectacular looks by sharing their secrets.

In what looks like something straight from a hipster Instagram feed, the book is split into fresh, foraged, dried and festive projects detailing the equipment and plants needed, with a particular focus on flowers from the garden. Projects vary in complexity, ranging from taping dried lavender, ferns and achillea to walls with great effect, to a full-blown meadow ball using hanging baskets, floral foam and plentiful flowers and foliage. The instructions are easy to follow and the tone is friendly and accessible, right down to the practicalities of soaking floral foam correctly.

This is a book for people who love having flowers in their home but might want to try something a bit different to traditional floristry and rethink how to use flowers in a more artful form. The beautiful photography by Kristin Perers and the step-by-step guides, as well as the fresh layout of text and imagery, is endlessly inspiring. Worth every penny of the £14.99 price, it will have you reaching for a linen smock and Swedish clogs – and planting Lunaria annua.