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Blog Post

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Thanksgiving Flowers

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This season we have created some autumnal designs that are bright, sunny and … warm! It is, after all, the season for giving thanks.

We found some darling Terracotta and Ghost Pumpkin Planters and created sweet arrangements that are perfect for an intimate dinner —they also happen to make fancied-for host gifts. The ceramic pumpkin can be reused as a decorative piece, vase or even a stylish storage container.

For a larger table, we recommend our Signature Centerpiece— which is all flowers!

For those who love the warmth of a traditional vessel, we offer our Overflowing Cornucopia. Some have mini-gourds or pumpkins nestled amongst the roses, hypericum berries and chrysanthemums.

Let us know if we can deliver to you —we offer free delivery in Croton to make your life a little easier— or have it ready for you to pick up in-store. Our shop hours not align with yours? We cheerfully open our shop by appointment, so please let us know!

In keeping with the spirit of Friendship and Abundance, we are giving you an Early (Turkey) Bird Discount!

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Order your Thanksgiving Centerpieces by Sunday 11/24 and take 10% off!

Use Code SQBZQ71 when ordering online.

For more details, or to order easily online, check out our Thanksgiving Arrangements!

Do you envision something entirely different for your table? We can make it happen! Contact us at (914) 862-0755 or send us an email at info@uppervillageblooms.com.

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The Moon Hat

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We have officially heard that anything with the NASA logo is played out for the next fifty years, or at least until humans land on Mars. Thankfully, we have got your heads covered!

Upper Village Blooms is proud to now carry the Moon Hat!

The Moon Hat, by Croton’s own Dan Cummings, is a remarkable science teaching aid as well as fashionable headgear.

In both beanie and baseball cap, crisp and bright embroidered moon phases wrap around the head. Each image is placed to create a precise 360˚ model of the Moon's orbit around the Earth. It’s both beautiful and functional.

The Moon Hat comes with instructions sewn inside so you'll always know the moon phase names, which order they go in so you can orient yourself to the moon’s location.

Forbes named the Moon Hat “Best Science Gift of 2018”! And this year, with the 50th Anniversary of the Moon Landing, it will be an even more timely gift for your favorite budding astronaut or rocket designer. For adults and kids alike, the fleece cap is stretchy and warm, and the baseball hat is distinctively sharp looking

Remember, it is good to be curious!

Follow Dan’s Blog at Star in a Star. Star In A Star was founded to improve early astronomy education by anchoring it in the physical world of people, objects, and places.

Vanessa's Tomato Jam!

Upper Village Blooms is very excited to announce that we now carry Vanessa’s Tomato Jam! We are especially proud to announced that this is Made in Croton!

Out of desperation, Vanessa Sudnik began making her Tomato Jam in order to use up all of the end-of-season fruit in her husband’s home garden.

This delightful concoction can be described as an American chutney —it is lighter in body with a perfectly balanced flavor. Vanessa’s Tomato Jam pairs well with stinky, washed-rind cheeses like taleggio, but it’s also delicious served with tangy cheddar. Substitute it for sweet chili paste in recipes, serve it on lamb, pork, poultry and beef, and it takes any potato —roasted, mashed, fried— to the next level! It dresses up grilled cheese sandwiches as well as turkey like you wouldn’t believe.

It will be your new favorite addition to your charcuterie board or sandwich.

$13.99 for an 8 oz jar

VanessasTomatoJam

Stop by Second Mouse Cheese Shop in Pleasantville for accompanying delicious cheeses and charcuterie!

Special Blooms for L'Shanah Tovah

Rosh Hashanah is a two-day holiday marking the Jewish New Year. This year, September 29th at sundown, and ends at sundown on Tuesday October 1. The new year will be 5780.

It is both a solemn and festive holiday. At this time, we reflect on our actions and life of the past year. For this reason, it is also known as The Day of Remembrance, or “Yom Hazikaron”.

There are several food rituals associated with Rosh Hashanah, such as it’s traditional to eat a fruit you haven’t eaten for a long time on the second night of Rosh Hashanah. Symbolic foods include pomegranates, leeks, and yes, fish heads! However, everyone’s favorite is apples and honey, which is to encourage everyone to have a sweet new year.

Rosh Hashanah is also a time for gathering with family and friends over a traditional dinner.

It is entirely appropriate to give flowers on this holiday, and a custom flower arrangement from Upper Village Blooms is a perfect choice to give as a host gift!

Traditionally, for the high holidays, white is significant. In synagogues, many fabric items are replaced with white versions-- for example the curtain in front of the ark (the Parochet), or the Torah covers. The color white represents a clean start and a blank canvas on which to begin the new year.

Flowers in an autumnal palette are also an excellent choice, as the holiday is usually in September or October.

Upper Village Blooms offers all types of flower arrangements for every holiday! We only use premium flowers that are hand-selected by us for freshness. We’ll also deliver for free to anywhere in Croton!

Call us to place an order for your New Year’s Flowers and we wish you a Shana Tovah!

Rosh Hashanah Inspired Music for you to enjoy:, these are all live versions:

Mogwai “My Father My King”

Leonard Cohen “Who By Fire”

Phish "Avinu Malkenu"

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Columbia Road Flower Market

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Our Twitter feed somehow is filled with gorgeously creative flower designers and shops in the U.K. For inspiration, we follow the Royal Horticultural Society and Flower Joos, among so many others!

On a recent trip to London, we were determined to visit the Columbia Road Flower Market. It is an open air market occupying roughly a block of Columbia Road in Bethnal Green, East London. Open to the public on Sunday mornings, it is jam packed with shoppers looking for flowers, plants, pots and antiques.

From the beginning of its historical record, Columbia Road’s unsavory past has been … dark. It was an area where crime was rampant and Resurrection Men hid out. The London Burkers were feared body snatchers in the early 19th century, selling cadavers to anatomists for a pretty penny.

In 1869, the land was purchased by Baroness Angela Burdett-Coutts in order to save the area from its grim reality. Her intent was to create a fish and produce market and indeed, produce was sold there for about twenty years, until it closed and went into decline. The Baroness spent a fortune on a Gothic Hall market which was never really used, as the locals preferred to sell in the open air. (The Book of London Place Names, Caroline Taggart p. 197.)

The market evolved into a flower market, with songbirds for sale. The market, originally held on Saturdays, was moved to Sundays in order to accommodate Jewish traders. This was upheld by an Act of Parliament. The market has endured, despite a direct bombing during the Blitz on September 7, 1940.

This thriving market was festive on the day we visited, with street buskers and flower sellers calling their pitch “ev’ry thing a fiver!” We browsed everything from potted chillies to bamboo and all the gorgeous flowers in between. The hydrangea were in season and everything looked so inspiring!

Open every Sunday from 8am to about 3pm.

Sources and more info:
Caroline Corinne’s The Women of Columbia Road

Columbia Road Flower Market

And please, follow us on Twitter!



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NY Now Gift Show

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Twice a year, the NY Now Retail Renaissance gift show visits the Javits Center, giving retailers opportunities to see over 2,300 brands of products. Home decor, bath and beauty products, stationery, accessories, jewelry, and specialty food items are featured from all around the world. It is a convenient way for us to browse new brands, sample items, and reconnect with our established vendors.

This week, we walked many miles for several days, winding through the vast array of products, trying to avoid collecting too many heavy catalogs and failing.

We sniffed more lines of candles and home fragrance diffusers than we can remember and sampled so many hand lotions, body creams, and balms that we we’ve been light-headed and shiny for days. Oh, the things we suffer through!

Now that we are back, we are poring over catalogs, calculating minimum order prices and wishing we had a million dollars so we could bring all these fabulous products we found to Croton!

Here are only two dozen of the pictures we snapped!


@uppervillageblooms on Social Media

The business of running a business can be fun or it can be tedious. Or it can be conflicted and be both. Social media is one such thing for us.

When we first began nearly a year ago, it was unthinkable to not feature our business on Facebook. This is how we narrowcast to our closest friends and immediate community.

Being florists, we are so lucky to work in such a powerful visual medium! Instagram is where we flex our sexy and where we get to see our business neighbors and partners loosen up!

A few months ago we decided to jump on Pinterest primarily to save and share images and ideas between us. We also use it to share with our brand partners and colleagues, such as Root, Branch & Blossom. For example, we have partnered with them to create a bespoke home fragrance line for Upper Village Blooms! While this is in the early stages, we find that sharing our vision with them using Pinterest has made communication easier. But then we realized we are only using a fraction of Pinterest. So we created boards for our retail shop and flower designs, have a total of 4 followers and here we are!

Lastly, who really wants to be on Twitter besides Chrissy Teigen, kids who aren’t allowed to have Reddit, and Russian bots?

We are so late to that ballgame, but we have finally succumbed. Our policy is to tweet nice things only, like about flowers and good neighbors. We are truly happy we are to be a part of our Westchester County community and this is where we are starting to bloom!

#uppervillageblooms #crotonflorist #crotononhudson #CrotonNY #westchesterNY #lohud #flowers #florist #luxeblooms #blooms #localflorist #hashtaghell 🤣

Seeded Eucalyptus is a Myth!

#floweroftheweek

#floweroftheweek

Seeded eucalyptus is back and we are so excited that we made it this week’s Flower of the Week!

There are over 700 different species of Eucalyptus, most being native to Australia. Eucalyptus trees or shrubs have a high degree of variance among them. Their leaves and bark may have vast differences, but some commonalities include the eucalyptus oil on the leaves, toxicity, and a fast growth rate.

Eucalyptus is a popular choice in modern floral arrangements, and florists appreciate the differences in leaf shape and structure. The most popular type we use is termed “seeded eucalyptus” —however, it is actually any type of immature eucalyptus with the operculum attached. The operculum is a bud cap that holds the flower in and gives the capsule a fatter look. It’s not actually a seed! Nor is it a variety, but a developmental stage.

From April to mid-July, florists are hard-pressed to lay hands on this popular greenery choice. We love using it in our designs because it adds so much to the overall arrangement: the olive tones of the leaf complement the darker, more deciduous shades of fern and grass; the structure of the opercula bring an exotic texture against the softer forms of roses; and the form itself of the eucalyptus creates a yielding structure for the individual blooms.

And of course, we love the smell of Eucalyptus! When we have any left over, we use it at home for self-care. Some ideas are to tie leaves in a loose bunch and steep in a hot bath; hang several stems of Baby Blue and hang upside down in the shower for a fragrant steam; or dry your eucalyptus leaves and store them in sachets for a natural insect repellent.

Remember that the leaves are toxic when ingested. Keep it away from cats who can’t be trusted not to eat things.

Also, if you’re interested in reading about how gold was absorbed into the leaves of Eucalypts in Australia, check out this Smithsonian Article! Nature is metal.

Sources:

Australian Plants Online, by the Association of Societies for Growing Australian Plants

The Mayesh Minute Short Video on Seeded Eucalyptus

A Trip to 28th Street

Yesterday was a perfect day to wake up painfully early and visit the Flower Market in Chelsea!

With the change of the seasons, we’ve been looking for an infusion of energy and creative inspiration. Visiting the tulip farms outside Amsterdam isn’t an option this year, so we went to New Amsterdam to find the new flowers we crave.

First of all, why can’t we find Tuberose anywhere in Westchester but we can buy them at any Dean & Deluca in the city? Every single flower dealer on 28th St. sells them! We bought two bunches (the second dealer we visited had the healthiest selection) and are patiently waiting for them to open and release their fragrance. Polianthes tuberosa, of the asparagus family, is a night-bloomer native to Mexico.

If you’ve never smelled a tuberose in bloom, it is worth your while to stop in and sniff them. It gets the oxytocin going.

Stopping in at Caribbean Cuts, we met with Tom and talked about drying lotus flowers, heliconia, and how much we loved their sprouting coconuts. We walked away with one of them, and he gave us his tips on how to care for our new Sprout! You can see he’s in our window.

Below you can see some of our favorite things from our trip: baby Pineapples, budding fuschia Magnolia branches, giant Thistle, and miniature Carnations that are the size of a dime. You might even see some of this unique gorgeousness in our corsages and boutonnières for Jr Prom this Saturday!

Buying Local Flowers

When it comes to buying flowers, you can order online at a reseller, go to a supermarket, or order from a local florist. We understand that you have choices, and that sometimes one is a better choice than another. 

At an online reseller, your flowers choices are limited to what’s on the screen. Look at the photos and you will see that each floral design can be broken down into a very specific recipe to allow it to be cheaply and easily re-created. If the vendor belongs to a wire service, each layer of service provider (POS, florist, delivery, etc) takes a percentage of your money. The hard-earned, post-income, pre-sales tax $100 that you spent has dissolved into $75 worth of flowers. And after commercial shipping, they look rather worse for wear. 

At a supermarket, your money buys a lot of cut stems. These flowers are standard varieties and grown in the cheapest conditions. The design and care given to these flowers are minimal, and that’s all we really need to say.

Some local florists belong to wire services, and for this they pay fees every month. As above, your flowers are compromised by the percentage slices claimed by this marketing chain.


Upper Village Blooms takes orders only from our customers. Therefore, we do not pay wire services to bring in volume business. 

We drive ourselves to the flower wholesale markets twice weekly to hand-select the freshest flowers available. The flowers we choose are above-market and are not available to supermarkets and wire services. When we return to the shop, we typically spend 3-6 hours cleaning, trimming and preparing them. We give them another quality check, and only then do they go into custom arrangements or are available for you to choose as a single bloom. 

When we sell you flowers, we expect to see you again. Either because we’re neighbors or our kids are in the same school, or perhaps because our flowers are extraordinary. We care for them tremendously, it is what we do. We also sneak more flowers into our arrangements and bouquets because it is another way to show how much we love our flowers!

We are a small retail shop in an amazing Rivertown with foot traffic, wheelchair accessibility and parking. When we say we are proud to be a part of our community, we mean it —we do not charge a standard delivery fee within 10520. 

Come visit us and see how the Upper Village is Blooming!













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Little Light Pottery

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Orit Daly —a Croton-on-Hudson potter— introduced herself to us last year, correctly thinking we’d be in love with her line of botanical pottery. She takes plants in various stages (and seasons) and then imprints them in her art. Obviously Upper Village Blooms was smitten with this idea! 

After spending some time together with Orit, we realized we had a lot in common. Specifically, we love plants and flowers and we ❤️ Croton!

We commissioned her to create bespoke art celebrating the natural beauty of Croton. After agreeing, she then asked —What if we make something useful as well? 

A fruitful and creatively collaborative partnership was born!

We now present our Riverwalk Collection, three designs of our beloved Croton Landing, available in mugs and trivets. The trivets can be used practically, and when not in use it hangs on the wall. 

Orit’s line drawings of the Riverwalk capture the stark beauty of the Hudson River in winter. The slats of the walkway, curves of the path winding along the riverbank, and the graphic beauty of nature all represent our particular claim to the Hudson. 

The method in which Orit captures her art on our mugs and trivets is called the Mishima Technique. It originated in East Asia in 9th century Korea, then it travelled to Japan where it got its name. This method of incising and inking images before the glaze is applied perfectly evokes the linear aspects of Riverwalk in winter, with narrow-leaved cattails, reeds, willows, oaks, and the Palisades.

Stop into Upper Village Blooms and admire Orit Daly’s work, then have a lovely stroll on our Riverwalk!

Orit Daly from Little Light Pottery presents her Riverwalk Collection exclusively at Upper Village Blooms.

Little Light Pottery
Instagram
Facebook

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Getting ready for Valentine's Day Part 2

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Oh the flowers!

We cleaned over 600 roses alone and it was worth every scratch and heavy bucket. We’re not sure if we can trust anyone who doesn’t like dogs or roses.

No, it’s not too late to call to order flowers for pick up or delivery tomorrow!

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Getting ready for Valentine's Day Part 1

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We have been busy over here, getting ready for our first Valentine’s Day!

Despite the snowstorm, we received a giant shipment of TokyoMilk products. We re-stocked some favorites and ordered a few new scents, such as La Vie La Mort and Honey & the Moon. We added Pretty Rotten perfume and Kabuki Shea Butter Hand Creme. We are grateful that we had the chance to put this out in time for Valentine’s Day.

Our Bath & Body wall, includes TokyoMilk, Root, Branch & Blossom, Lovewild Design.

Our Bath & Body wall, includes TokyoMilk, Root, Branch & Blossom, Lovewild Design.

TokyoMilk Date Night. Includes Dead Sexy #06 Eau de Parfum and Lip Gloss packaged set in a luscious tin. Extremely limited stock.

TokyoMilk Date Night. Includes Dead Sexy #06 Eau de Parfum and Lip Gloss packaged set in a luscious tin. Extremely limited stock.

Silken Body, Silken Lips

It's perfectly easy to begrudge St. Valentine's Day, which is based on Valentine of Rome, who was martyred in 269 CE. He is the patron saint of beekeepers, happy marriages, affianced couples, and against fainting. 

Since we opened, we have proudly stocked Root, Branch & Blossom's all-natural and effective personal care products, such as Silken Lips, All-Clean Hands, and Slumber Salts. For this Valentine's Week only, we are pleased to offer a thoughtfully-curated special.

Exclusively at Upper Village Blooms is the Love is in Blooms Bundle! This includes Silken Lips, Silken Body, and the ever-popular Slumber Salts. At $24.50, this is a perfect gift for your Valentine. It also is a spectacular savings, with $7 off the retail price! 💗
It’s like getting Slumber Salts for nearly free!

Silken Body, Root, Branch & Blossom’s signature Skin Smoothing Oil, is a coconut/safflower oil based blend with a subtle scent that includes lemon peel. geranium, lavender and rose absolute. This is a light weight oil that offers a smooth glide for post-shower or massage that melts into the skin. We are offering it at $19 for this Valentine’s Day, or $5 off regular retail price.

Root, Branch & Blossom is one of the main lines of Attract Essentials, the creator of Intention-Based Aromatherapy™. We are so pleased to be one of their retail partners.

http://attractessentials.com/

@attractessentials


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What's Your Intent?

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Do you believe you have a purpose?

Could you be kinder to yourself?

Do you need help focusing on the positive?

I’m not alone in constantly trying to make my life a little better by adopting healthy attitudes and habits, or letting go that which does not serve me. And in addition to that reminder app, I also seem to need a physical token to prompt me down the road to consistency.

Intention has proven to be an effective change catalyst, however we all need reminders and gentle nudges to help us on our way to enduring change.

If this is resonating with you too, please read on!

MyIntent Jewelry is a wonderful way to incorporate positive thinking in our daily life. With some guided thinking, choose a word or phrase that communicates your Intent. Perhaps you want to overcome a challenge, start a new habit, or commit yourself to specific change?

Take three deep, slow breaths. Be present, accepting, and kind to yourself.

Your word will come to you, and when it does, we stamp it on a steel token that you can wear or reflect upon daily. My bracelet reminds me to FOCUS.

For more information, visit their website or pop into Upper Village Blooms. We can help you come up with your word and we will personalize it for you.

MyIntent1.jpg

Twist Bracelets $25, Classic Bracelets $25, Dainty Necklace $35, Chain Necklace $25, Bead Necklace $25, Token only $12-15.

For help finding Your Word, visit the MyIntent.org Word Finder

If you like nice smells and impeccable design...

Skeem Design is a husband/wife team who creates stunningly designed gift items for the home. 

They combine quality scents with gorgeous design, and to further this brilliance, they design to eliminate unnecessary packaging.

Field Jar Candles and Vintage Matches

Field Jar Candles and Vintage Matches

Most of their containers are easily reusable.  They have a sensual way with scents —just sample their strong Arabica Coffee Field Jar candles or Palo Santo soap. Their soy-based candles and match bottles are “hand-made in small batches in the USA”.

Here, we feature selections from their Talisman collection, which is based upon the legendary Four Thieves blend. Here’s the quick story:

Six or seven-hundred years ago during the Bubonic Plague, four thieves stole the possessions from the myriad dead. Legend claims they stayed alive and avoided the Black Death because of a special blend of essential oils in vinegar. The recipe for vinaigre des quatre voleurs was known as:

Take three pints of strong white wine vinegar, add a handful of each of wormwood, meadowsweet, wild marjoram and sage, fifty cloves, two ounces of campanula roots, two ounces of angelic, rosemary and horehound and three large measures of champhor. Place the mixture in a container for fifteen days, strain and express then bottle. Use by rubbing it on the hands, ears and temples from time to time when approaching a plague victim.

Rene-Maurice Gattefosse, Gattefosse’s Aromatherapy (CW Daniel Company, Ltd. First published in Paris, France in 1937 by Girardot & Cie.), 85-86.

There are as many different recipes for this blend as there are variations of the story, but the effectiveness of the blend is due to the anti-microbial properties of essential oils.

We offer the Talisman essential oil roller ball and soy-candle. Use the roller ball to combat fatigue, as a mnemonic aid for studying, or simply to transport your senses to a calmer place. Pair the candle with the astronomy matches and you have a lovely gift to give someone.

Skeem Design’s Talisman Collection with Astronomy Matches.

Skeem Design’s Talisman Collection with Astronomy Matches.

#skeemdesign

For more information on the properties of essential oils, try the

National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy










Painted Tongue Press

Upper Village Blooms offers an exclusive selection of greeting cards that is unlike anything you’ll find in these hinterlands of NYC, and we take pride in it. It’s eclectic, sometimes irreverent, polite, and always tasteful.

Painted Tongue Press immediately caught our eye with their letterpress botanical cards. They are pressed on creamy, substantial paper and colored delicately. Unlike anything we’ve seen though, Painted Tongue Press cards are pressed on both the front and back.

We got excited over some gorgeous floral-themed cards and then saw the envelopes! Most people do not notice envelopes, those hard-working postal messengers, but you cannot help admire these. And so will the lucky person receiving them. 

Use them for absolutely any occasion and they will convey how much you care. They are the anti-thesis of a text message. Or a blog post.

Painted Tongue Press

Oakland, CA

Callifornia Poppies and Queen Anne’s Lace

Callifornia Poppies and Queen Anne’s Lace

We left the protective film on these cards, hence the shininess.

We left the protective film on these cards, hence the shininess.

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Shiny Skull Productions

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DSC00462.jpg

We are so thankful to Alex Joseph of Shiny Skull Productions for taking these photos of our floral arrangements. He did an exceptional job capturing the texture and nuances of the flowers in our romantic arrangements. We can’t believe how gorgeous they are!

Take a look at his Facebook Page!

https://www.facebook.com/shinyskullproductions/

©2018-2024 UPPER VILLAGE BLOOMS LLC