This past weekend, I finally nailed down a flower supplier who is local, chemical-free AND who will have flowers blooming in mid-May–my wedding time. It showed me that you sometimes have to go through quite a bit to find the suppliers you are looking for, but it pays off in the end. To find this person, I started by searching for organic flowers in Lawrence, Kansas. That led me to Lynn Byczynski, the local author of the book The Flower Farmer: An Organic Grower’s Guide to Raising and Selling Cut Flowers. Lynn doesn’t grow flowers for weddings, but she was able to get me in contact with Jozzy Schimke from Earth Flowers in LeCompton, Kansas…just a hop, skip and a jump from Lawrence. They grow flowers in hoop houses, so they have blooms earlier in the year than the other, exlusively outdoor flowers farms. Earth Flowers lets customers come out and choose their own flowers and arrange bouquets on their own–something I wanted to do with some friends of mine who are good at that sort of thing. Now I will be able to afford the type and kind of flowers I want, and I will know that they have not been treated with chemicals and shipped halfway across the country! Anyone looking for local farms in their area can also rely on Local Harvest, which offers a searchable database of food and flower farms across the U.S. I will be adding as many green wedding resources as I can find to this blog, so keep checking back.
