Muddy Boots Special Guest: Petrina Blooms

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:05

Hello, I'm Elizabeth, an obsessive backyard gardener, who might be able to offer you a couple of tips.

SPEAKER_01 0:11

And I'm Keith, a landscape consultant, and I'm also passionate about gardening.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

The one thing we both have in common is muddy boots. Today we are stepping into a garden that many of you will already know and love. The extraordinary Melbourne garden of floral designer Petrina Burrell, better known in the social world as Patrina Blooms. From abundant garden-grown flowers to stunning arrangements and installations, Petrina has built a loyal following both on and offline, inspiring thousands through her creativity, generosity, and love of flowers. Today, Keith and I are going to chat with Petrina about her journey into floristry, how her magnificent garden came to be, what it's really like turning flowers into a career, and how social media has played a huge role in sharing her work with the world. Petrina, welcome to Muddy Boots. Hi Petrina. Hi, thank you both so much for having me. It is so lovely. We've been looking forward to this for ages. So, can you take us right back to the beginning? What was your gardening story? Tell us, how did it all begin?

SPEAKER_00 1:24

Well, I was very fortunate to grow up with a dad who was the king of growing vegetables, and then mum who was the queen of growing flowers. Oh, you were so. So my brother chose vegetables and I chose flowers with my little sister. So there's always a big divide in my family. Um, and so I grew my first carnation when I was six years old, and she was beautiful with little extraordinary perfume, and it all started from them, and then I created a rock garden. Mum said you can have that part, it was all shady. So I had to put in ferns and spider ferns, and I love that that tiny little rock garden is still in mum's garden today.

SPEAKER_03 2:03

And that was a bit of a challenge giving you a shade garden to start with. Hard to grow flowers, but obviously you had great success because that has led to the fantastic career that you have. So after that, um, was floristry something that you had an interest in from the early days, or did that sort of unfold gradually? Tell us the story.

SPEAKER_00 2:24

Always wanted to be a florist. So if you see in my grade six diary, it says, When I grow up, I want to be a florist.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_00 2:33

So I was fortunate because um I did work experience when I was 16 at the local florist, and I wrapped red roses and pink carnations for two weeks and cleaned buckets. Oh, no, I didn't think you could see the next step, which was like sunflowers and making actual arrangements, and that's what I wanted. So I asked the nice lady, oh, please can I have a job? And that turned into every Saturday at the local shopping center at a place called Stars Florests. And then from there, I just kind of worked my way up into flower houses. Um, and then, but it was always casual because I never wanted to curse a flower, and floristry is it can get really hard, you know, events and functions, it is, and I never wanted to curse a flower, and plus I'm quite slow, so there was always a bit of a that's why I think I joined the slow flower movement, but I've always just done it on the weekend. Slow flower movement.

SPEAKER_03 3:27

Tell us about that.

SPEAKER_00 3:28

Oh, it's a beautiful movement that started a long time ago, and it's all about just as you think fast food, think the opposite. So slow food, slow flowers, so organically grown, no nasties, no pesticides, right? Um, seasonally produced, working with what the garden offers.

unknown 3:49

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

So the slow flower movement, and it's really beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 3:54

Yeah, absolutely. So, how did Patrina blooms come to life? What you know, both as a business and creatively, obviously.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

Um, so I've always been creating um my whole life, working in florists, and I've always been doing my garden. Um, but then in COVID, uh my girlfriend asked, Oh, please can you put some flowers together for me? And I had 14,000 growing, and then I just whipped through a bouquet arrangement and then I put it on my Instagram. And I think at the same time, I flipped my private account to public. And that's when I realized that growing 14 flowers probably isn't normal.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

14,000 you mean 14,000, not 14.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

14,000. I've always had this illness where more is more, you know, I just love beauty and I love joy and I kept creating. And that's when I realized, oh, okay, maybe most people don't do this.

SPEAKER_03 4:48

Yeah. So, but before that, you you actually did work as a florist. You had your own business or you worked with other people's businesses?

SPEAKER_00 4:55

So I always worked for others. So I worked um at Flowers Barzesh and some of the Melbourne brand and Poland and Art Stems. Um, and I always worked in freelancing for my friends, doing weddings.

SPEAKER_02 5:08

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

And then I did a lot of traveling when I was an air hostess. So I worked for the Sheikh in Dubai and in London for a bit. So different flower houses around the world, but never for myself.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

Um, that just came about accidentally through COVID. Right, okay. When I posted this bouquet and then the demand was there, and it just kind of blew up. Um, and then I just accidentally got back into the flowers. It was just meant to be.

SPEAKER_03 5:33

Yeah, tell us about that. So tell us about the garden, because for those people who haven't seen or not following you on Instagram, if there are any, tell us about the garden and how that's evolved over time.

SPEAKER_00 5:44

So the beautiful garden, we would have moved here when my son was in my tummy. So oh no, my daughter, so sorry, 14, 15 years ago, and the garden had the bones, so it's north facing, and it had beautiful established gums up the back on a hill, a gliditia sunburst, um, and it had the bones, and then and the wisteria. Oh, and then I cleared the whole lot. And the poor lady who owned this home, I'm sure she thought, who has bought my garden? I felt sorry for her because she was a gardener, she just had it was like a jungle. She had everything and anything. It was wonderful, but it was very eclective. Yeah, and I had this vision um for a lawn with flowers for the kids. Yeah, and so then I flattened the whole thing and made a big green lawn and put in maybe I think maybe it was only eight, I mean a lot still, 8,000 bulbs. And it was this huge, ugly deck, and I wanted to cover this deck because it was so ugly. So I got out all these pots and created a deck garden and grew flowers and pots to cover this deck.

SPEAKER_03 6:51

Amazing.

SPEAKER_00 6:51

And then as the kids got older, they didn't need the lawn. So I and it was kind of an illness, and I kept digging it up and digging it up, and then I realized all the pollinators and mother nature like I don't need a lawn anymore. So I've just taken up more this year as well. It just keeps disappearing. There's hardly any lawn left.

SPEAKER_03 7:10

How do you do it? How do you because I know that you've had some issues with your back recently, and that and how is that? Is that is that improving?

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Yeah, look, I was very grateful. It was a 10 out of 10 operation. Um, I said to a dear friend who's a gardener, I said, Oh, my back, she goes, You're a gardener, we're all the same, and she's right, you know, all of those gardeners, it's either our elbows or our shoulders or our knees or our everything combination of all of those things, definitely. Absolutely. So I was just really lucky after the surgery and I fixed the disc and it's a 10 out of 10. And I just have to dart on smart now. So instead of listing up a whole box of 500 tulips, I'll get out of my little basket and smart.

SPEAKER_03 7:51

So it's just a lot more steps. A very good lesson for all of us because I'm the same, and I'm sure you're probably the same over the years.

SPEAKER_01 7:57

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 7:58

I would just get grab at you know, things and just pull them out and do things, and now I'm really my my elbow, my knee, my hip, everything. It's like going, oh I mean, it's so gardening is the best thing for us in so many ways, physically and mentally, all those sort of things. But we have to be careful, yes. We so we learn from you now, Betrina, from what your your experience that's fantastic. So true. So tell us about your floral style and what influences your designs.

SPEAKER_00 8:21

So with my um what I was doing 15 years ago, I was creating the garden in my bouquets. So for me, it just my bouquets are just an extension of what you would see in a flower garden. So you would see movement, you would see flow, you would see mother nature's beautiful escape. You know, I use flowers that have rain damage on their petals. I love the walking skin, you know, which is the opposite of hothouse grown flowers. So everything grown in Mother Nature, I I work with her and what she presents, and I let the flowers guide my makeup. So often if people would order a bouquet, I would see what would catch my eye. And you know, if they were beautiful double Columbus trucks, so oh my goodness, there they go, they're my queen. So they could be my feature flowers, and then I'd look for the backup crew and see what colours and who's in bloom. So it's it is slow, Boris, it's slow gardening, and I would often sometimes just create my bouquets as I walk around the garden. So I pick the flowers, put them in. I have to use my teeth to help strip them.

SPEAKER_01 9:27

I hope you hope you're watching which one you're stripping, stripping out with. Hopefully, not the roses. Exactly. But that that style of gardening that you're talking about is is very similar to um Great Dixter. Do you have you ever seen Great Dixer over in over in the UK?

unknown 9:44

No.

SPEAKER_01 9:45

Christopher Lloyd, it was Christopher Lloyd's garden, and he had the same principles that you're talking about now. So the whole thing just evolved. It was no there was no structural elements to the the way that the garden was laid out. It was just it just happened, and it was just absolutely a magic garden.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

A beautiful mistake. Yeah, I call my garden my beautiful mistake. And because it this year, for example, I've got another, I've planted out 300 white Delphi nymphs and 300 blue Delphies, and about 500 Icelandic poppies and larks birds. I'm so excited because this is I've never done this on this numbers before. And I'm just thinking when I go to bed, I think about where they can go. This is how I go off to sleep. I daydream about my garden, you know, where I'm going to put them. But now I've got this beautiful wisteria, and I think, well, they look wonderful underneath, you know. So I'm thinking I'll pot out the whole deck, like a third of it, and just these Delphiniums. I want to create a fairy florist. Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 10:45

Beautiful. That's sounds beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 10:47

Yeah. Now you posted a shot recently of some beautiful, like a bunch of roses from your garden. Now I gather the rose is your favorite, or am I wrong? No, you're absolutely right.

SPEAKER_00 10:59

The garden rose. The garden rose. I just love her so much. Yes, I talk to my flowers. Obviously. Oh, she's just beautiful. I have over 50 garden roses, lots of David Austen's, old world roses, and my favorite would probably be my Lamarck.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

Lamarque, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

I I was told it was a rambler, but I think it's actually a climber because she repeats flowers at least three times a year.

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Yeah, and that's incredible. That's incredible.

SPEAKER_00 11:28

And it is. She is, she will give you those three flushes. She's just finished her last one, and she wraps the whole house in flowers, which is stunning. And then I have a wall of David Austen's on the side, and then a front fence of New Dawn and Claire Austen, and then they're just scattered all throughout. And what I love was where I used to live, used to be a rose farm for acres and acres. Guy Rossi, he was a rosarian. Yeah, yeah. So roses grow really well here in Ivanhoe in the soil. They love it.

SPEAKER_02 11:57

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 11:58

That's gonna love to go back in time.

SPEAKER_03 12:00

I want to ask you about the soil as well. How do you how do you keep up with all of this? Because you've got thousands and thousands, you said 14,000 flowers or whatever it is. How do you keep up with it? How do you maintain the soil? What and do you have help?

SPEAKER_00 12:12

How do you do all this? No, it's just me. I wish. You know, sometimes they say on Instagram and so and my hubby did this today, and I'm like, oh gosh, I call that hubby like that. I said to my hubby in my next life, I'm gonna marry a labourer or something. I wish. Um, no, it's just me. So, for example, I just turned over all the soil. I thanks to you, Keith. I heard about the beautiful soil you're using. So I spoke with Vince and lovely, all this beautiful compost came in. Clyde compost.

SPEAKER_02 12:44

Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_00 12:44

Clyde, and oh, I've never been so excited about a soil delivery. Oh my goodness. I was telling everyone at this fancy ball I was at for the school mum's lunch. My soil is coming tomorrow. My compost is coming tomorrow.

SPEAKER_03 12:56

What did they make up? We all have that conversation.

SPEAKER_00 12:59

You you know they would just look to me like I had two hands. What's wrong with her? Fortunately, they all know my know me, but yeah, so I was so excited. And then I put it through, but I did get help with this because of my back. So I did ask D Hubby and a dear neighbor, and they helped bring it in. And we've put it over all of the garden beds.

SPEAKER_01 13:16

Yep, fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

Because, as you know, Keith, and it is all about the soil.

SPEAKER_01 13:20

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

And so she's depleted now, she's tired from all the summer crops, and I would do that once every two years, uh two years, a really good boost. Yep, otherwise, I'm using my compost.

SPEAKER_01 13:30

Yep. And but I just needed a lot more. Yeah, you can you can never create enough compost for your own garden. And that's I think this is a this is how we actually started communicating was um me doing a someone doing a post on uh a particular brand of potting mix, and I said, uh, gee wish you're gonna enjoy the oxalis that comes out of that. And that's uh well, that's where our conversation actually just all began, I think.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

I was furious, I was furious. I bought in this big brand and oh goodness, just the oxalis. Yep, you know, that's so hard to get rid of. I've tried for years and years, you know, use the suppressor, use the cardboard, I've listened to some of your podcasts, but yeah, that's very difficult.

SPEAKER_03 14:09

Never get quite get rid of it all, can you? We know about that. No. Now, do you create for events and installations? Are you still doing that? Or are you just I used to, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:18

But that's I used to, but um, I've I think at the moment I've I've gone off. I love doing floral bouquet workshops. I just love them because the people who either come into my home or the workshops that I go to, you know, people just want to be lifted up by joy, and they just oh it always marvels me that they think, I'll book this morning, I'm gonna look after myself, I'm taking a risk, I know it's gonna be fun in some way, but I don't know how exactly. And it's just people are so lifted up when they're working with Mother Nature and like-minded women. I just find them the most beautiful people, they're gardeners, they're growers, they love flowers, and the workshops really bring community for me.

SPEAKER_03 15:02

And you're dealing with together, dealing with beauty, do dealing with things of colour, and uh it's just I mean, there's nothing negative about that, and we need more positive things in our lives. So that's all part it's all positive stuff and dealing with you because you've got such a great, you're so you're so passionate about it. So I don't know how that can't rub off on the people who come and look for you really.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

I'm quite obsessed, you know. I don't realise this. I I will take flowers everywhere I go. So I picked up my bread this morning and I take them roses and I go out for dinner to restaurants. I will always take my own flowers to put in a glass of water. But whether it's for breakfast or lunch or dinner, I'll take my own flowers. And all my friends know this, which is sweet. Everyone expects it. So I'm completely obsessed with flowers and I have this love affair, this relationship with them. I could just look at their face forever.

SPEAKER_03 15:49

Oh, I know. It's a it's a the happy smile on their face, absolutely. Now, tell us about the garden tours because they're not just national, or they're not they're not Victorian, they're you're you're international, aren't you? You you're doing some international stuff.

SPEAKER_00 16:01

Yes, yes. So um, well, last year I opened my garden up for the first time, and that was lovely. And I do a really intensive hour of a tour, and I go from the very front start garden all the way through to the back, and I talk to them about the process, about everything in my garden, what works, what doesn't work, what's been super failed, what's been super successful, and why. So the quite in-depth talks.

SPEAKER_02 16:25

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

And last year we had over a thousand people at least, you know, with huge waiting lists, huge waiting lists. To come into your garden, to come into your garden.

SPEAKER_02 16:34

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:35

And that was one day just one day. No, that was over the blooming seasons. So I think maybe over four weekends, five weekends. Um, and we don't we worked a lot of money went to mental health, youth mental health is just close to my heart. Yeah, um, youth suicide prevention. So, you know, they're good fundraisers and beautiful people, and we have a good laugh. There's always a laugh. Good. Um, and then I'm also doing workshops. Um, I've got one coming up in France in Grasse, which will be exciting. And then India, I'm about to launch one in India this February, which is exciting.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Fantastic. Yes. Lucky you.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

That's that's taking so that is taking um people from Melbourne to or around Australia.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

From all over the world. So I'll launch it in a few weeks. So I've partnered with an Indian tour company, and I didn't realize flowers were so big in India, but they're huge. So we're going to the floral heart of India and we'll work with flowers in food, in creating bouquets, in screen printing. It's a curated experience. They've put a lot of work into it. It looks incredible. And it's just a small group of 10, and it will be 10 days of India and flowers. Oh, I want to go.

SPEAKER_03 17:44

I want that. Come along.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

Oh, that moment, come with me.

SPEAKER_03 17:48

Come on. I'm coming. I'm coming. Yeah, so any for any of our listeners who might be dreaming of turning their passion into a business, do you have any tips, any any suggestions for them to you know to get started?

SPEAKER_00 18:01

That's a really good question. I would say it all starts with start really small and start local, start with friends, start with families. You know, if do you know anyone who would like to buy a bouquet? Do you know anyone who would like to get married and just elope and have a small wedding bouquet? Yeah. Um, start with your community. Do you have a local cafe? Say, I grow these dahlias. Would you like fresh bunch here once every week? I always say start small. It's all about your community. Start a new community, and then it's all word of mouth from my experience. So I've had that many people say, Oh, I heard you're the flower lady. Can you please do some flowers for me? You know, and that's I do a lot of word of mouth work now because that's kind of like a control that that's easy. That's someone around the corner. So I always say start small and do what you love.

SPEAKER_02 18:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:55

So if you want to start a garden business where you're a cut flower grower, you grow what you love because you're going to look after that.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 19:03

If you want to be a florist, do a style that you love, you know, true to who you are, you know, because the love will come easily. And it it's just an extension of who you are, and people will see that in your work.

SPEAKER_01 19:15

And your passion. Yep. Absolutely. That's great.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

If you love natives, go for it. Yeah. You know, natives are stunning. And there's a market out there for beautiful natives only, I think. We're lucky here in Australia, what we can do and grow. Yeah, the options for sure.

SPEAKER_03 19:30

I love that the slow garden movement that you mentioned in the beginning. That sounds really interesting. So that's too so when it comes to floristry, the business of floristry, you're trying to work it so that we can maybe become more organic because it's not obviously quite not organic, really, still in the forest world.

SPEAKER_00 19:47

Yeah, so um, there's this new movement, not really that new, but beautiful Rita, who's worked with sustainable floristry, and she's done a lot of research into being sustainable florists and and how it looks after our planet. Yeah, you know, and I'm a huge space nerd. I'm into science and physics. That's my passion. I love reading about particle physics. I'm seeing Brian Cox on Saturday night, Mark. Oh, wow. So and it just makes me realize how precious our planet is. You know, and we're here for such a short amount of time. So it's not about me, it's about my grandkids and their grandkids and their grandkids and how we're leaving the planet for them. And floristry, there's a very dark side to you know the oasis, that green stuff that you shove flowers in. I don't, I don't think that ever breaks down.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 20:34

You know, and it's just almost so countercultural to the way nature is, and then we go and create all this plastic and crap and put flowers in it. I swear flowers cry every time they go in Oasis. You know, um, so I I hope to make you know make a small difference, but I'm organic, slow grown. My carbon footprint, when you grow your own flowers, you're literally just walking outside, there's no air miles.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

No.

SPEAKER_00 21:00

When I lived in Dubai, I would see all the roses being flown in from Nairobi to Dubai, and there was a hang up and they'd stay there, then they'd move on to Holland. Huge aircraft hangar. It was a like a massive flower. That was in a market, it's where they were stored. Yeah. And they were sprayed in all the chemicals, you know, and then there's someone's son spraying those chemicals. That could be my son, you know. So well done, you're just about educating. Oh, well, just educating other florists and being mindful of our beautiful planet. We only get one crack at it and then we leave it for everyone else.

SPEAKER_03 21:35

And you just sort of wonder why anyone would be doing anything chemically now when they really don't need to. We are fantastic organic alternatives. So yeah, absolutely. So the more we educate, or more you educate, and we would try and do our little bit.

SPEAKER_01 21:46

We do.

SPEAKER_03 21:47

The better, the better. Petrina, thank you so much for welcoming us into your incredibly colourful world. And we would love to actually come and see your garden one day. Maybe we can join a tour. I'd when you have to do that.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

We'd love to come up and do a podcast in your garden. How about that?

SPEAKER_00 22:00

VIP. Come on in. You can meet my cats. Lavender the head gardener and Button's the assistant.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

We can meet my cats. You're so welcome to come into my garden. That'd be lovely. It's a fairy tale. It's all in the book. I just wrote a book and it will be coming out in March, and it's called A Garden of Joy.

SPEAKER_03 22:17

Patrina, you are such a busy girl. This is amazing.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

Oh, the book is beautiful. We were shooting it for two years, and all the seasons, everything is from my garden. It's it's it will be lovely, lovely resource and lovely to look at with a cup of tea. Oh, yes, can't wait.

SPEAKER_03 22:32

We'll be getting one of those, definitely. Okay, so it's been so lovely to hear your story and gain a deeper insight into life of a floral designer. So thank you so much for that. And you were a great inspiration with so many people, to us, us included. And I you know, I just everything you're doing is so positive. So thank you so much for that. We have had a lovely, lovely chat, haven't we?

SPEAKER_01 22:51

Fantastic. Lovely, lovely talking to you.

SPEAKER_03 22:52

Thank you both so much. It's a pleasure.

SPEAKER_01 22:54

Pleasure, thank you.

SPEAKER_03 22:56

Bye bye. Thank you for listening to Muddy Boots. For more information on today's podcast, please go to muddyboots.net.au and happy gardening