Central Southland Floral Art Club

06/10/2026

22/09/2026

The evening’s Tutorial was presented by Rae Baxter who spoke about the concept HANAKUBARI. In Japanese ‘hana’ means flower, and ‘kubari’ means support. The term originates from the artform of Ikebana and refers to hidden natural, organic supports for flowers and foliage. Contemporary HANAKUBARI was initially promoted by Keita Kawasaki of the Mami Flower School in Japan, who brought the support mechanism out into the open so it became a visible, decorative and integrated feature of the artwork. No twine, wire, nails, screws or other man-made materials are used, designers rely instead on splitting, wedging, clamping, tension and weight distribution to achieve a successful design. HANAKUBARI designs are fully sustainable and eco-friendly so very ‘on trend’ since we’re thinking more carefully about the products we use and the effects on the planet. Rae demonstrated three designs using HANAKUBARI materials from her store cupboard, and challenged members to create their own version using what they had at home or could forage.

Helen Baird shared an idea with “tatami”. She showed us a selection of trees she had created using willow, silver birch, cornus and muehlenbeckia. The tatami method was used to attach the wreath rings to each other.

Rebecca Shearing and Fiona Carson treated us to a wonderful “Spring Surprise” demonstration and workshop, continuing with the theme of designing without oasis. The evening was full of inspiration and creative ideas, including weaving wire mats and frames to support stems in water bowls, using aluminium wire to attach test tubes to rocks, arranging tightly packed stick offcuts in water-filled trays to secure stems, and creating a paper mâché vase with test tubes tucked inside.

Members then had the opportunity to put their creativity into practice, designing and making their own unique floral vessel using a rock and aluminium wire.

21/09/2026

Our September competition bench - An Interpretive design. Members were asked to include the written title with their design. The interpretation was to be appropriate and meaningful.

14/08/2026

Our 50th anniversary featuring Auckland-based florist, Franca Logan, earlier this week was a true celebration of creativity, friendship and design. All our club members had a role to play in ensuring our special day ran smoothly, from demonstrator assistants, gathering plant material, catering, hosting our guest, designing flowers for the venue, organizing raffles and making floral pins for each of our current members, everyone contributed. It was definitely a case of “teamwork makes the dreamwork”!

Achieving such a milestone is a good opportunity to reflect on what we’re all about here at Central Southland Floral Art Club. Established in April 1976, the Club has continued to be a friendly and enthusiastic art group for the past five decades. The Club programme focusses on all aspects of floral design with beginner to experienced designers catered for through tutorials, workshops and sharing of ideas and knowledge.

The past 50 years have seen club members presenting numerous local Exhibitions and Demonstrations, and being involved in designing flowers for many private functions and countless weddings in and around Central Southland too. Our club members have been involved in the Floral Art Society’s Conferences and National Exhibitions throughout New Zealand, and in 1996 the World Association of Floral Art’s World Show in Wellington. The Club is justifiably proud of club members tutoring, demonstrating and competing successfully at floral events in Canada, France, Belgium and Australia.

In recent years our Club Programme has been moved to be ‘in house’ with teams of club members being responsible for researching and sharing contemporary concepts and techniques. This helps our members keep abreast of new trends emerging on the international scene, and we’re proud that our Club and its members are seen as one of the trailblazer groups in contemporary design in the country.

We’re delighted to have a wide range of age groups represented in our Club, and people from varied backgrounds. All enjoy our meeting nights, sometimes there’s just not enough time for all we want to achieve! We’re all looking forward to continuing in this spirit for many years to come.

CHEERS, and here’s to many more years of creativity, friendship and design.

14/08/2026

We were absolutely delighted that Auckland-based florist Franca Logan accepted our invitation to come South to share an afternoon of creativity, friendship and flowers to celebrate our Clubs 50th anniversary. Club members welcomed past members, members of Clubs from throughout Southland, friends and family to “The Hideaway” at Lochiel, near Winton for this special event.

Franca demonstrated 9 designs, all with a casual, whimsical, random ambience. Her structures were artforms in themselves, even without plant material. She likes to use gatherings and gleanings in her floral design pieces - branches of fennel, p***y willow, dogwood, miscanthus, grassheads, dried seedheads, and especially moss and lichen covered branches – which she tied into structures with paper covered wire. Then she wove fresh plant material through the structures – blossoms, tulips, orchids, roses, chrysanthemum, Early Cheer jonquils. She spoke about ‘layering’ plant material, overlaying one variety over another but loosely so each piece can be seen.

Franca brought much of the plant material for her demonstration with her, some from her home and garden and from foraging around her West Auckland neighbourhood. Other material came from Auckland flower growers and the market. There were many oh’s and ah’s at the depth of colour in the Black Onyx orchids, the huge pitcher plant, the bromeliads. And while we were gushing over the plant material she has access to, she in return enjoyed coming to Southland in late Winter as she could really see the outlines of our tree branches, the useful “Roadsidia” we probably ignore as its so commonplace, and the dried materials from members store sheds, like the “fairy grass”. Our p***y willow and early blossom were also a favourite.

Messages conveyed included …

Don’t waste anything - off cuts of grass stems can be saved for weaving through wire structures, offcuts can be attached to a light wire for ‘overlays’, sticks can be punched onto nails on boards to create wreath-type designs.

Learn how to make wire forms to use in your work, material can be attached to these or woven through.

Combine ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ materials for juxtaposition within a design – masculine material contrasting with a softer feminine material like trails of Chain of Hearts and ‘fairy grass’ for example

Learning the rules, then learning how to successfully break them

This was a very special afternoon and one we won’t forget for a very long time. Special thanks to Franca for bringing our members and visitors the joy of floral design.

11/08/2026

🌸 The excitement is building! 🌸

We are thrilled to have Franca Logan here in Southland, busy preparing some beautiful designs for her demonstration tomorrow.

We’ve had a little sneak peek and can’t wait to see what she has created for us! There is sure to be plenty of inspiration, creativity and gorgeous flowers to enjoy.

We look forward to welcoming everyone tomorrow for what promises to be a very special afternoon celebrating 50 years of the Central Southland Floral Art Club.

21/07/2026

We might be the depths of Winter here in the Deep South of New Zealand but a large and enthusiastic group came together to share some mid-Winter magic at their July meeting.

“SPECTACULAR SPATHES” was the theme for our design team of Paula, Wendy and Ashley. Our members are far more accustomed to working with Bull Kelp and Phormium than spathes as palm trees just do not grow this far South. So it was a real treat for the team to work with some magnificent spathes Ashley had acquired through a North Island contact. Paula, Ashley and Wendy experimented with how to work with this ‘new’ material and explored many design, staging and mechanicing possibilities. They dug deep into the realms of our Floral Art Shed and brought out some staging treasures including a turntable, probably last used a couple of decades ago but with the help of a handy hubby now runs like a dream. The resulting designs were an absolute delight. A few lucky members were able to take home a spathe to experiment with too and we look forward to seeing them included in design work in the future. More examples of the “Spectacular Spathe” designs in our next Facebook post.

Our “SHARE A THOUGHT” segment … as our 50th anniversary celebration approaches, Rhonda reminisced with four books from her bookshelf, two pertaining to the almost forgotten craft of Botanical Collage, and two Floral Art Society books (1996 and 2005) which Central Southland Floral Art Club members had work published in. They may be oldies but the work is still very relevant today. Susan spoke of other artforms she persues as time permits, painting and crochet. Her blankets were beautiful and we can learn a lot about pattern and colour harmonies from studying them.

The Competition title for July was “MATARIKI” and of course designs on the Show Bench focused on the star cluster and new beginnings for our gardens though it doesn’t exactly seem like ideal planting weather just now.

Next month is our 50th anniversary celebrations with Franca Logan from Auckland being a Guest Demonstrator at a function on 12th August. Limited tickets are now available for the public, details elsewhere on our page.

16/07/2026

We would love you to join us for our 50th birthday celebrations.Limited tickets available by contacting Wendy Bates on 0272701254 or email [email protected]

15/06/2026

Last night was our Mid-Winter Christmas demonstration.

Our demonstrators, Anna, Estelle, Susan and Sheree, shared a collection of festive designs using flowers, foliage and natural and foraged materials. From a rustic wreath and contemporary Christmas trees to creative seasonal designs, there was plenty of inspiration on display.

Our competition bench title was "Edgy and Innovative".

11/06/2026

We have an exciting few months ahead and our programme is attached.

Whether you are completely new to floral art or have years of experience, our club caters for everyone from beginners through to advanced designers. We offer a welcoming, friendly environment where you can learn new skills, be inspired, and enjoy the company of fellow flower lovers.

New members are always welcome, and we'd love to see some new faces join us.

Why not come along and give it a try? Your floral art journey starts here!

Our next club meet is:
Monday 15th June 2026, 7pm
Presbyterian Church Hall, Meldrum St, Winton
We will have a mid winter Xmas demonstration.

Any enquiries pm us or you can ring or text Anna on 0274915547.