Foxgloves Flowers

A Uniquely Victorian Flower Shop | Florist Victoria BC

5 Tips for Creating a Unique Holiday Wreath

It’s officially wreath making season! Here at Foxgloves, we are all about unique creations using items you can find throughout your home and in the outdoors where you live. We love unique holiday decor, that is hand-made and brings the holiday spirit to your home.


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We have come up with useful 5 Tips to help you create a holiday wreath that is truly unique and one-of-a-kind.

  1. Culinary herbs and spices are a wonderful additions to your wreath. Bay leaf, rosemary, oregano, and thyme all work wonderfully to create a herb-themed wreath. You can hang it in your kitchen from a cabinet door to add festivity to your kitchen. You can even use pieces of it in your cooking!
  2. Take a walk in the woods to get inspired. Cedar, pinecones, bark and wild berry branches that are in your neighbourhood woods are all perfect for incorporating into a rustic, earthy wreath.
  3. Dried ingredients can add in beautiful texture. Dried fruit like oranges, cranberries or grapefruit adds in unique texture and pops of colour. Even a sprig of dried lavender can add in the wonderful calming sent.
  4. Simple or extravagant, let your creativity flow. Wreath making is all about having fun, we encourage you to make a day of it. Plan it out with friends or your family members. Prepare a few days before with cutting branches and gathering supplies. Extras to help include a glue gun, wire and clippers. Get creative!
  5. Don’t be shy about making a statement with the finishing touches. Adding in a large bow, tying ribbon in throughout, looping on a bell to jingle – these all finish your wreath with the perfect topping.

For more tips, you can find us featured in a recent blog post with Redfin – find it here.

Flower Subscriptions

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The Best Gift Ever!

Have you ever been thinking about what to get the “perfect gift” for the person who has everything? Or is just plain hard to shop for? Well, we are here to tell you, this is it! you have found that gift. You have hit the best gift idea ever jackpot!!

We have YOU (or that special someone) covered for a year, 6 weeks or 6 months of flower delivery, right to their/your front door!

How it works

Once you’ve placed the order, we look after everything else. Every week or month, on the anniversary date of the first order (or the closest business day to it) the flowers are delivered. The recipient will receive the hand-tied bouquet designed to go right into their vase.  All that is required, is to re-cut the stems, add in fresh water, add flower food (included) into the water and voila! the perfect beautiful bouquet to enjoy.

Can the subscription be paused?

Yes! If the subscription needs to be paused due to travel, renovations, a personal matter, whatever — we have that covered! With that very first delivery, a card is included, explaining directions if the subscription needs to be postponed for any reason. Even to have specific dates changed! All that is required is to give us a call and let us know!

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What’s Included?

Included in the purchase of your subscription, is a card explaining the wonderful gift to the recipient and of course the flowers!  Whether you have chosen 6 weeks, 6 months or a whole year of flowers they will all come wrapped and ready to go into the recipients own vase!

What are the subscription options?

6 Months send love and beautiful flowers once a month for 6 months! Every month a lovely hand-tied bouquet will arrive wrapped and ready to go into the recipients vase. This includes delivery for all 6 months!

6 Weeks Order 6 weeks of fresh flowers delivered to your/someone you love’s door. Once per week for 6 weeks a fresh hand tied bouquet of blooms will arrive, ready to go into your vase. This subscription can start at any time of year and will include a seasonal selection of blooms and foliage. Always changing! Always fun and different!

1 Year The perfect understated and thoughtful gift idea. Choose from different monthly options within the yearly subscription. From elegant, spectacular roses or seasonal. The year subscription has an option for any flower lover! Each month the bouquet style of their choice will be delivered to their door.

 

For more info about our flower subscriptions head over to our website here!

Farm Cart Update (May 20th, 2020)

48 days remaining — that’s how much time we have left before Saanich is set to shut down the Foxgloves Flowers flower stand at 2825 Heath Drive.

Back on Monday May 4th, we were granted a 45 day extension to our original shut-down-before-May-22nd-or-receive-a-fine order. This extension was intended to hold us over while Saanich staff has had a chance to review the temporary emergency motion to allow farm stands within the Saanich urban containment zone. Saanich council is set to meet on Monday May 25th to debate and vote on this motion, based on the recommendations of Saanich staff.

It was clear to council that something should be done in the short term, and we’re hoping that they have had several weeks to consider that the interruption to business caused by COVID-19 will not be over on Tuesday May 25th.

Businesses are only now starting to re-open at partial capacity. We have been instructed to still not gather in groups, never mind large groups that are typical of the event types that we provide flowers for. While we here at Foxgloves have had some small elopements proceed with their plans this summer, more or less all events of over a few guests are being postponed.

The reason they’re being postponed is that no one knows when we’ll be allowed to have as many guests as would attend a wedding or event in one place. Some venues have even outright shut down for the 2020 season entirely. Others venues are unsure as to whether they’ll have staff available, and how much work will be involved in making the location safe.

While some hotels may end up re-opening soon, cross border travel is still restricted. Should the border open up once again, the question will remain as to whether the airlines will be ready to take on passengers, and whether guests will be able to fly here and find suitable accommodations.

For any who have planned a wedding, you know that the basics of finding a reception venue, ceremony venue, and someone to perform the ceremony, florist, DJ, caterer, photographer, and cake decorator (just to mention a few of those involved in making a wedding a day to remember), can seem extremely overwhelming. Throw in uncertainty about whether your guests can travel and find accommodation, or whether your venue will allow as many guests as you’d like… and many are likely to just say “Oh **** it, let’s just do this next year”.

This is why we’re fighting to be allowed to keep the flower stand open through the summer — to help offset this incredible loss of wedding and event revenue.

If you would like to contact the mayor (mayor@saanich.ca) or council (council@saanich.ca), to voice your support of allowing us and other farm carts for the summer under this extraneous situation, please do.

-Brandon Devnich

Author

Brandon Devnich is the husband of Colleen O’Farrell (owner/operator of Foxgloves Flowers). While not normally in a day to day role at Foxgloves, Brandon manages the website and ecommerce operations. He has also found a new role in helping to drag the flower stand out and back each day. You may find him greeting you at the flower stand, or puttering around the front gardens muttering to himself about how the kids need to go back to school before he loses his mind.

Farm Cart Update (May 5, 2020)

Last night, Saanich council met to discuss a number of topics, one of which being the fate of the Foxgloves Flowers flower stand (farm cart) at the front of our property which is in a residential area.

The Short Summary

In short, the result was that while there was no permanent solution allowing us to continue, we were granted an extension to our existing 30 day requirement to cease the retail stand by an additional 45 days.

Council and mayor were in unanimous support of this extension.

We have until July 7th now, before we need to shutter the stand.

Moving Forward

While we were a bit disappointed that there was no permanent solution put in place that covered our situation, and that the extension did not cover us until the end of summer, we are very grateful for the reprieve. It seemed clear that the council and mayor were attentive that something should be done in the short term to allow our stand to continue, as was the very vocal will of the community which was demonstrated through many emails to council and mayor.

A friendly amendment was made to the motion that was on the table to temporarily allow for farm stands within the urban containment boundary, to allow for those offering ‘value added’ items. While ‘value added’ is a fairly vague term, and of some concern to some council and municipal staff, because the motion of concerned is considered a temporary measure acting much like a pilot project, council and mayor also seem to be in support of allowing it to move to debate in the coming weeks.

We hope that the motion to temporarily allow farm cart sales within residential areas will be passed before our extension expires so that we can continue to operate for the summer.

Why Are We Doing the Flower Stand?

If you’re reading this and wondering why we are fighting to have a flower stand in a residential area, I’ll provide a bit of a backstory.

Colleen has operated Foxgloves Flowers out of her studio for the last ten years. Prior to that, she had a retail shop down on Johnson St for ten years. But when we started a family, she made the decision to switch to a studio setting so that she could provide more balance with being a mom and a business woman. Being in the studio, it gives her a chance to grow from the gardens and pick flowers specifically for day-to-day orders or for wedding and events. Retail has been the farthest thing from her mind for the last ten years. And having the ability to be around the family while still operating her business has provided much needed balance.

When The World Changed

It was mid March, and the world was suddenly struggling with a pandemic. COVID-19 had put a stranglehold on the local economy and we were thinking that this may be the end of Foxgloves. The phones stopped ringing, the online orders dwindled to nothing, and all the events and weddings that were queued up for the summer cancelled or rescheduled for fall or 2021. Around 80% of Colleen’s summer business is comprised of weddings, funerals and other events, all of which are impossible to be held now as large gatherings are not permitted.

What was she to do?

Well, as we’ve said in the past, when life gives you lemons, pull out the lemonade stand. And that’s just what she did.

An event cancelled at the last minute, the phones were quiet, so she did what she considered the unthinkable and put her flowers out at the end of the driveway (at our son’s lemonade stand) by donation. She made a post out to social media to say “if you need some joy, take some flowers”.

And that was March 17th.

A Seemingly Beautiful Solution

Quickly, the flower stand became a popular place to stop by just to get out of the house. Local neighbours loved the ability to add some flowers to their homes without having to go to a crowded grocery story. People on their walks (because everyone was getting out for a walk because they all had cabin fever) would grab something on the go. Visitors started asking if we could get veggie starter plans, an annuals, because they didn’t want to go to garden centers.

We were covered on CHEK News on their “Upside” segment as a feel-good story. We were overwhelmed with support, and it looked like the fear and worry about the loss of a significant portion of the summer business was going to be offset by the flower stand.

Just When You Thought It Was Going Well

And then on April 22nd we received a visit from Saanich bylaw explaining that we could not sell retail — there was a little bit of fine print which we had not been immediately aware of, which prohibited it.

We were resigned to the fact that, while we had been granted 30 days to finish up what we were doing, that the summer was going to be tight.

But then Colleen became determined that perhaps we could ask for some sort of exemption given the times — perhaps council and mayor could have compassion for small businesses that are attempting to be creative to get through these times. This was not intended to be a long term solution, and to be quite honest, once normal events can resume, even if we are permitted to operate long-term, we will likely shutter the flower stand as it is a tremendous amount of work to maintain daily.

But as it is, right now, we’re trying to make the best of a difficult situation.

Since April 22nd, we’ve been overwhelmed by the community support for our stand, by the signatures on the online and written petitions, the accompanying comments, the letters written to mayor and council, and by the kind and supportive conversations that we’ve had from visitors.

While the original date to the enforcement deadline has been extended further, we are still going to pursue the temporary motion which would allow other farm stands to operate within residential areas until such time as a more permanent bylaw that addresses the issue can be put in place.

Moving Forward

Tough times are still ahead. There is still uncertainty where it comes to the economy. But we’re determined to keep moving ahead, so that we can survive and be here for when we get past COVID-19.

-Brandon Devnich

Author

Brandon Devnich is the husband of Colleen O’Farrell (owner/operator of Foxgloves Flowers). While not normally in a day to day role at Foxgloves, Brandon manages the website and ecommerce operations. He has also found a new role in helping to drag the flower stand out and back each day. You may find him greeting you at the flower stand, or puttering around the front gardens muttering to himself.

Flower Delivery in Victoria BC amidst COVID-19

It’s not easy to self-isolate — we’re social animals. We want to get out and make connections, human connections, to reassure ourselves that we’ll get through these tough times.

Colleen and I struggled with a lot of decisions surrounding Foxgloves over the last couple of weeks. Ultimately, everything related to Foxgloves is her decision (Foxgloves has been her baby for coming up 20 years soon), but as we’re both business owners, and we talk the same language, we support each other’s business when tough times come to town.

Colleen isn’t just a florist, an artist, a creative… she’s also a spark… a catalyst that brings colour and joy into so many lives on a regular basis. And she couldn’t just stop doing what she as doing because of a [more than a] few rough days. She was determined to continue, somehow, of bringing light and happiness through flowers to as many as she could, despite the community self-isolation.

In deciding how to move forward, Colleen has decided to make some adjustments for everyone’s safety:

Floral Delivery

Until further notice, all floral deliveries will be “drop at the door” with a call to the recipient’s phone number. There may be a ring of the doorbell, although even that little button can be a point of contact that the drivers will want to avoid. We apologize that we will not be hand-delivering at this time, but for the safety of the recipient and the drivers, and all those that they would come into contact, we are limiting contact with recipients.

Pick Up Option

We’ve always had the ability to “Pick Up” your flowers at Foxgloves, when ordering over the phone. We’ve now added that ability through online ordering. There are two pick up windows (10am-1pm, 1pm-4pm) to choose from.

Pick Up Table

If picking up from Foxgloves (2825 Heath Drive, Victoria, BC), your order will be labelled with your name on the “Pick Up Table” just outside the front door of the studio. We ask that you not enter the studio, but if you need help (or have a question) just holler. Colleen is either in the studio or out in the gardens tending to her “beauties”.

New Studio Hours of Operation

Because of the COVID-19 global crisis, the business is also impacted in a number of other aspects. First, Colleen had to make the heartbreaking decision to temporarily lay off her much-loved staff. Also, we have two young boys at home now, who require a fair bit of attention, with schools being indefinitely closed. This means that the studio will operate in reduced hours. The new studio hours are:

  • Monday: 10am – 4pm
  • Tuesday: 10am – 4pm
  • Wednesday: 10am – 4pm
  • Thursday: 10am – 4pm
  • Friday: 10am – 4pm
  • Saturday: Closed
  • Sunday: Closed

New Farm Cart Hours of Operation

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade! In this case, use your son’s lemonade stand and pivot to a new model of business operations. As of the beginning of April we have been operating a Farm Stand at the end of the drive at 2825 Heath Drive.

Hours: 10 am to 7 pm Daily or weather permitting.

It is a strictly self serve and honour system with 3 contact-free payment options available for your convenience.

Contact Free Payment Options:

  1. Cash in the honour box
  2. E-Transfer to info@foxglovesflowers.com (please don’t forget the s on foxglove in the middle or it won’t work!)
  3. Our online portal at foxgloves.shop for credit card and Paypal transitions.

Wedding Consultations

And because life goes on, and so does love, brides are continuing to plan their weddings for later in the year, or 2021. Foxgloves (and Colleen) are still doing wedding consultations, but for the time being all consultations will be done by phone or video call. You can book your consultation online

Floral Availability

While we have long been a “local first” florist to keep our carbon footprint as small as possible, these times have made the availability of some flowers “uncertain” due to import and economic changes.

We source our flowers from the Heath Dr gardens first, then local growers, local suppliers, and then lastly, if the need arises, through global suppliers

There may not be as much diversity in the flowers that we’ll be using for the next few months, however, they will be the freshest that are available. This is why you’ll find the options available, to order online, limited to “designer’s choice” — we are unable to keep the fridge as fully stocked with the normal selection until imports become available again.

As of the time of this writing (March 23, 2020) the tulips, ranunculus, and anemones are all flowering in the “hoop house” (giant greenhouse on the property) and many more around the gardens are just about to pop.

We’re Here With You

It’s a trying time — if you’re younger or older, at home with kids, or still working in an essential service, none of us is unaffected by these changes.

But we’ll all get through it if we remember that while we’re keeping our distance from one another, that once isolation is no longer required, that we’ll enjoy our connections that much more.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

-Brandon Devnich

Author

Brandon Devnich is the husband of Colleen O’Farrell (owner/operator of Foxgloves Flowers). While not normally in a day to day role at Foxgloves, Brandon manages the operation of the website and ecommerce operations. He knows very little about the difference between an Amaryllis and an Agapanthus flower.

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