My Floral Journey - Ash, Owner of Film & Foliage and Wildflower Academy

When I began my floral journey over 12 years ago, I struggled to find up-to-date educational resources, sustainable techniques and a non-competitive community. Floristry really felt like a gated community and I did not have the lockbox code to get it. 

Over the years and since starting out and fumbling my way with Film and Foliage, I’ve learnt (through many trials and many errors) how to create a dream floral career, techniques for sustainable floristry, as well as seeking beautiful floral friends and creating a community.

Driven by a desire to give others the knowledge starting out what I craved I often shared the BTS of running a floral design business and creating foam-free installations, as a result, Wildflower Academy emerged. This platform allows me to pass on my knowledge and experience of working for over a decade in the wedding industry, retail spaces, overseas destination weddings and large-scale events, to florists at all skill levels.

Sharing every misstep, hard lesson learnt and success story means that you can fast-track your business to create the dream floral life you desire.

I thought it was a good time to share my journey, taking a walk down memory lane and acknowledge where I’ve been to get to this point.

The Early Days

During a very interesting formal training experience at TAFE I injected my frustrations from the limited, outdated designs we were taught into my personal practice and while I was freelancing for free, exploring the flower markets and making flower crowns for my room mates, one of my co-workers at the cafe I worked at asked me to flower up her wedding, I was honoured, of course and stressed out, even more so when all of my flower order didn't arrive and I panic shopped at the local retail flower shop (omitting any chance of making a profit). Wildly, that wedding landed in the pages of White Magazine (a wedding directory and magazine back in those days), opening doors to future opportunities and offering exposure to my accidental business venture.

I started finding any way possible to sell my wares and get my hands on flowers. The Hunter and Gather Markets in my hometown of Newcastle offered me an opportunity to meet some new people and try my hand at retail florals. My partner and I handmade some crafty signs (I still have the original Film and Foliage sign in my warehouse) and packed the bunches in the car at 5am to get ready for the day.

I fell in love with collaborations and styled shoots with fellow wedding vendor friends and anyone who could possibly want flowers in their life (special mention to my friend Ruby who tolerated me and modelled for almost every single one) to showcase my work, expand my skillset and I was lucky to get my florals published in wedding magazines, propelling my business forward and growing my brand awareness.

(below is a fun shoot I did with my friend Kathryn who owns Camp Cove Swim)

I’ve entered and exited a couple of ‘eras’ of the years…

 My ‘Wreath Era’. I carefully dried florals and tore up my hands creating so many wreaths for people’s homes and did a few wreath workshops as well at local cafes (thanks for coming Mum!).

My ‘long lasting installation era’ where I began offering dried floral installations for businesses. I had so many fun concepts, as well as so many dried flowers in my hair and clothes at the end of the day. I loved how this connected me with the Newcastle Community and local business owners like me.

Back before I had a beautiful warehouse with a room for photoshoots I used the bathroom mirror, random fences, walls and carparks. My first studio was my spare bedroom at home, I hung a sheet on the clothesline to take photos (I had to wait for the sun to shift every afternoon to do this).
This was an era in itself, with plenty of creative strategic thinking to show off my work in images and problem solving (how many blossom bundles can fit in the bathtub before we are unable to use the shower...)

Growing and Achieving Dreams

I continued to teach myself, through so many trials and errors, on how to create large scale foam free installations. I soon started to get some dreamy wedding briefs and beautiful local venues AND worldwide.

It was a dream come true, literally getting paid to fly to private islands in Malaysia and mountainsides in New Zealand.

Practice, practice, practice, I started noticing improvement in my design skills and really settled into my style.

The Birth of Wildflower Academy

When COVID-19 lockdowns hit, I found myself with time to reflect and create. During this period, Wildflower Academy took shape in my mind, a space to share my floral knowledge with fellow florists who wanted to build their businesses. Months of hard work building the website, learning video recording and editing, and sharing imperfect but valuable tutorials culminated in the launch of Wildflower Academy.

Amidst the challenges, my dreams were materialising. I got the keys to my dream warehouse (9 times the size of the current shed), took a rogue side quest by designing, manufacturing and selling the Flower Towers – our sustainable florists dream mechanic for large installations. Film and Foliage underwent a rebrand, attracting dream clients and larger budgets, setting a minimum spend of $10,000, and capping 2024 bookings at 20 weddings (the literal best thing I have ever done).

I continued cultivating the Wildflower Academy, with over 100 class tutorials and a growing value. Every single day I do 1 thing that will improve the Academy by 1% for our members - whether it be sharing a story on socials, responding to questions in the community or tweaking the layout in the class library.

As I still continue to navigate the ever-changing floral landscape, I'm excited about what the future holds for this beautiful floral community of ours.

Join me on the journey inside our beautiful online floral community here!