Required Reading: The Modern Flower Press
London’s floral studio JamJar Flowers has been innovating since Melissa Richardson, a model agent turned florist, started her business channelling the naturalistic simplicity of the flowers that she picked as a young girl, arranged simply in jam jars on the kitchen table.
But over the past few years Melissa Richardson and co conspirator Amy Fielding have ventured into a different area of floral decoration with pressed flowers...
...and in a similar way through experimentation and inspiration started to develop myriad ways to use the simplest of flowers picked pressed and preserved forever
The authors, Melissa Richardson and Amy Fielding, in Melissa’s garden in south London.
One of the most influential images that kick-started JamJar’s foray into preserving was a photo of a collection of pressed flowers made during the first World War that adorns the bedroom of designer Christian Louboutin at his 13th century chateau in the Vendée region of France.
Designing with pressed flowers at the JamJar studio in Kennington, south London.
The book is divided into short essays on key flowers and plants that you might want to press, from wildflowers and spring bulbs though to summer favorites such as foxgloves, sweet peas, poppies, cornflowers, and nigella (arguably the best flower for pressing with its papers blooms and finely cut foliage).
All of this is fascinating, and the authors admit much of it was an education to them, too, as they researched through the first year of the pandemic.
Primulas and primroses pressed and displayed with their roots in tact.
But it’s the endless projects here that will probably be pored over and returned to again and again.
A wallpaper with pressed specimens created for an exhibition organized by Rakesprogress magazine using a heavyweight cartridge paper sourced at John Purcell Paper in London and hung directly onto the gallery wall.