ET01
Emily Thompson Flowers
South Street Sea Port, New York
ET01
Emily Thompson Flowers
South Street Sea Port, New York
Champagne and Caviar
Photography By HENRY HARGREAVES, words by LAUREN LEVINGER
SCULPTOR TO FLORIST
I used to be an artist, a sculptor. And then I accidentally became a florist, and then I accidentally opened a store!
CLEARING THE TABLE
We have been here at the South Street Seaport for two years. In recent months we have a staff meal once a week. Every Wednesday, during our staff meeting we do a staff meal. We do more frequent staff meals when we are doing events or projects, when people are sort of trapped on site. We try to keep people happy and moving. I think that this kind of thing, where you have to build your own meal is pretty inconvenient on job sites, but here, in the studio it feels so wonderful and lavish to just kind of throw everything off the table and put a meal like this out. We do this for our clients all the time, if not with food with other things like with displays and I think it’s really gratifying sometimes to just do it for ourselves. There is a lot more joyousness when you can have a family meal. It is the best thing for morale. We love our work and are really gratified by our work with the flowers, but sometimes just getting spoiled with something of a different sense is important who wouldn’t love it? We are all kind of greedy in our nature as florists. We are always wanting more interesting materials, more beautiful materials, more delicious fragrances... We are always seeking those things out, so it is the same with food.
ET02
ET02
FOOD AND FLOWERS
I think that our practices really mirror those of people who work in food. It’s all this perishable stuff, first of all. Everything is slowly dying, becoming less possible to sell. You have this short window of time to work with it, and all this skill is required and all this labor. It’s incredibly laborious. There are a lot of us, and that team mentality mirrors what happens in the food world. Also the materials, we are always trying to source things from different farmers and are dealing the seasonality of the local growers. There is also the seasonality of the global market and all of that is what our constant conversations and our research have to deal with. Which to me is what chefs do. Besides the actual making which is the other enormous part.
"There is a lot more joyousness when you can have a family meal. It is the best thing for morale."
ET03
ET03
THE BUTCHER OF FLOWERS
I consider myself the butcher of flowers. We have a guillotine over there by the sink! We are murdering these most beautiful specimens every second! But in all honesty, cutting the flowers doesn’t prohibit the growing of the plant, in fact it encourages it. Another thing that I consider one of my missions is to work with the invasive vines of our region I am doing everyone’s ecology a favor by tearing them out of the woods and then finding ways to make them very fancy for a dinner party.
ET04
ET04
TAKING A MOMENT
We try to do family meals whenever possible. We were very shoestring at various periods during the development of the accidental business that we have built, but we have always tried to do these meals as frequently as possible. I think it’s not just about the lavishness and the pleasure it gives everyone through the eating itself, but it gives us pause in the workday that is something we don’t have built into our typical routines. We are constantly under absurd deadlines and last minute requests. So that break is deeply luxurious for all of us. Putting the flowers away allows you a bit of a moment and you are able to come back with a fresh perspective.
ET05
ET05
"Putting the flowers away allows you a bit of a moment and you are able to come back with a fresh perspective."
dISH
Salmon roe, smoked salmon, creme fraiche, potato pancakes, rose champagne.
STAFF
Emily Thompson
Jamie Furlong
Phil Huynh
Ling Koh Hsu Whitehead
Sophie Stone
Kinga Mojsa
Alison Layton
Ren MacDonald
Find them here!