Writer: Hailey Evans
Photos: Duane Tinkey
If music is a universal language, a bouquet inspired by classic songs says it all. Rhianna Paxton understands musical connection — after all, her own name was inspired by Fleetwood Mac’s “Rhiannon.”
Music and flowers were both part of Paxton’s life early on. Her father has always had great taste in music, and her mother loved gardening before she died unexpectedly in 2018. Paxton restarted her own gardening hobby as a way to process her grief.
“It was cathartic,” she said. “Grief can make a person feel guilty, like you should’ve appreciated that person more or spent more time with them while you had the chance, but I realized that guilt I was feeling wasn’t true. Gardening made all those memories with her come back, and helped me move forward.”
She became more confident in her gardening skills, drawing on all the early lessons her mom had taught her. Paxton was listening to an episode of her cousin’s life-coaching podcast “Suddenly Spiritual” when the idea struck her to share her flowers with the community. In May of last year, she filed the paperwork to make Blackbird Bloom & Seed an LLC.
Named after the Beatles song, the business debuted on the farmers market circuit, selling bouquets from Paxton’s garden along with birdseed, flower seed packets and garden accessories. At press time, Paxton was working on a collaboration with Daisy Chain Coffee to sell bouquets in the East Village cafe.
A growing playlist
Paxton is a self-described perfectionist, a Capricorn to a T, if you put any stock in astrology. Before planting anything, she brainstormed the bouquet options she wanted to create with the resulting blooms. Then she mapped out which flowers to grow and precisely timed their blooming schedules. Her planning and planting process was meticulous, especially since she works with annuals rather than perennials.
The bouquets she creates from her harvest incorporate five basic elements: focal, disc, spike, filler and air flowers. Each bouquet gets its name from a song that represents something about the floral arrangement. Her “Hot Blooded” bouquet, for example, has red and orange dahlias, while a namesake “Blackbird” bouquet mixes black and white blooms. With one of her charitable options, “Heart of Gold,” she donates $5 from each sale to the Iowa Heart Foundation.
Paxton promotes her bouquets with images of individual flowers instead of the combined finished product, so customers can see exactly what they’re getting. “They might not know the names of flowers they like or what some look like,” she said. “Presenting them this way is a chance to make that connection easier.”
Creating a sensory bouquet
Sight: Paxton often separates bouquets by cool-toned flowers, warm-toned flowers and contrasting blacks and whites.
Smell: She considers how many fragrant flowers to use and how they’ll mix with other flowers. She uses several zinnia varieties, for example, since their minimal fragrance won’t overpower other blooms.
Sound: She names her bouquets after songs or lyrics that match something about the way the flowers look or smell.
Four tips for planting a cut-flower garden
Learn the names and varieties you like. If you have no idea, you can start with a Google search like “big round white flowers with long petals.” We all start somewhere.
Consider five sculptural elements of a bouquet — focal, disc, spike, filler and air flowers — and which flower could provide each. Polar zinnias are one of Paxton’s favorite filler flowers because they’re versatile in all kinds of bouquets.
Plan a cohesive color scheme. You can often buy seed mixes with warm- or cool-toned varieties of your favorite flowers.
Be patient. Always take time to smell the roses.
