How is Ikebana Sustainable? | Part 1

“How is it not?”…is what I want to say and call it a day, but some times you’ve got to play the SEO game, so here we are.

In all seriousness, it’s hard to know where to start, because for me, my floral design and practice was always going to be as sustainable as possible. If you know anything about me, you know I am huge on conservation and preserving the natural beauty we’ve been gifted.

Like most flower enthusiasts, I began my floral design journey by teaching myself through any workshop, class, and online content I could get my hands on. Most of the content I originally consumed surprised me—the floral industry HAD to be one of the biggest consumers of plastic. Most of the content I found seemed to rely on foam and single-use plastic. I have to admit, I didn’t love how it felt: polluting something I was passionate about, flowers, with plastic—something I loathe and have been trying to cut out of my life for years now.

During one of my Japanese tutoring lessons, I brought up that I was doing floral pop-ups and my sensei (“teacher” in Japanese) mentioned that she had just begun taking ikebana classes.

Ikebana: The traditional Japanese art of floral arranging

About a week passes, and I happen to attend Denver’s Cherry Blossom Festival. There, in a dark, unassuming parking garage I experienced love at first sight. Under the harsh layers of concrete was a humble ikebana display. This was the first time I knowingly saw ikebana in real life with my own two eyes. I was immediately hooked. The best part was that there was no foam and no plastic tape to be found. As a new floral designer, my mind began to race. How did these elegant, delicately balanced floral arrangements stand so strong? So stable?


More later… follow me on Instagram for now for more random thoughts and ramblings.