When Margot Shaw saw the floral arrangements at her daughter's wedding, the last thing on her mind was a botanical design magazine.
However, the deal with Sybil Sylvester began a path that led Shaw to create the country's only floral lifestyle magazine and publish his first book, Living Flowers, now in its sixth edition.
Shaw, founder and editor-in-chief of Flower Magazine, will discuss his vision for exploring the world of botanical design Thursday at 3 p.m. in a public lecture sponsored by the Palm Beach Garden Club and held in the Society's Gubelman Auditorium. About the four arts.
Shaw told the Daily News that he accepted the invitation to speak without hesitation.
"Someone emailed my assistant and I said, 'Sure.' This is my old place, I have cousins there... I stay with friends who live on the island,” he said.
Shaw said he sees an opportunity to put the city at the center of the conversation as the design capital of the South.
“There was Meg Braff (designer) ... and Lewis Miller, one of the best floral designers in the country,” he said. “I think Palm Beach is destined to become a major mecca for floral and interior design; "I think it's already happened."
Shaw's journey in floral design led him back to his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama.
“Birmingham is a great flower town and always has been. We are the only city in Alabama with a chapter of the Garden Club of America,” Shaw said. “And both of my great-grandmothers were founders... so it’s in my DNA.”
Although Shaw inherited a love of flowers from her family, she never joined a garden club or created flower arrangements.
He moved on, working with Sylvester when his eldest daughter got married.
“I worked on it for six months and finally thought: This is an art form. Not only that, it’s life-giving, inspiring and beautiful,” Shaw said about designing floral arrangements.
After the wedding, he called Sylvester and asked: “Can I come work for you for free?”
The answer is yes, Shaw said.
Shaw, who studied interior design at Hollins College in Virginia and the University of Texas, worked with Sylvester for four years designing event spaces and floral arrangements before the 2004 holiday season.
“I flew over Christmas break and wrote a lot of posts trying to find a more botanical lifestyle,” he said.
Many magazines are produced in Birmingham, home of Southern Progress Corporation, publisher of Southern Living and Coastal Living magazines, among others.
The lack of flower magazines gave me an idea.
“I couldn’t even find anything, and I remember a voice in my heart saying, ‘There’s no such thing as a flower magazine, you should open a flower magazine,’” he said.
Starting a new publication wasn't easy, Shaw said, "but everything I needed was here in Birmingham, I just had to focus."
One of these people was Karen Carroll, editor-in-chief of the now-defunct Southern Accents magazine, who was a mentor in the early days of Flower Magazine. He later joined Shaw after Southern Accents closed in 2009.
Shaw credits Carroll for his assistance in creating the botanical lifestyle magazine Shaw envisioned. Carroll also connected Shaw with world-renowned designers, including Charlotte Moss and Mary MacDonald.
"That's why we have (stylist) Charlotte Moss as a regular columnist," Shaw said.
After 16 years of publishing Flower, Shaw hopes the magazine can become a platform for the world of plant-inspired design.
“There are people who have studied and worked in design all their lives,” he said. “As a publisher, I want to advertise and promote this.”
This Thursday's lecture is free and open to the public on a first-come, first-served basis. The event continued with an autograph session.
Diego Diaz Lasa is a reporter for the Palm Beach Daily News , part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. He can be reached at dlasa@pbdailynews.com . Help us support our journalism. Register today.
This article first appeared in the Palm Beach Daily News: Flower magazine founder speaks at Four Arts in Palm Beach.
