Saturday Morning Flower Market!

Mimi, a school friend of mine, and I decided to spend one recent Saturday morning visiting the big downtown flower market. It's located in what couldn't be a more urban setting, since it consists of basically a parking lot surrounded by stores backing onto two huge airplane- hangar-sized warehouses. The warehouses, however, are filled with any number of beautiful stalls displaying hundreds of varieties, sizes, and colors of flowers and plants.

The early morning is reserved for professional florists with a wholesale badge, which are a hot commodity in the city and which we did not have. One of my other friends recently opened a flower shop in a small town south of the city; I wonder if she goes to the 5 am market! In any case, we wandered in after it was open to the public (trade business ends at 10 am). Since a picture can be worth a thousand words, I won't delay in sharing the rest of these with you. Needless to say, it was a beautiful and peaceful way to spend some lovely hours with my friend on a Saturday morning:

Orchids and ferns remind me of my high school years, spent in Singapore. Orchids are the Singaporean national flower, and they have one of the most beautiful orchid gardens in the world.

Our own SF Bay Area tends to be good for ferns because of the cool, foggy climate. I also enjoy growing indoor succulents and cactus, which are found naturally all over the west and southwest. Being at the flower market made me want my own garden. I'm so glad our new flat has a yard -- you can tell the family (I think mostly the Dad) gives it plenty of care and attention. I will post more pictures of home, but in the meantime, more of the astonishing beauty we found behind the cement walls of this downtown warehouse.

Each of us had a mission: I was buying flowers for our family to give my father for Father's Day, and Mimi was buying flowers for a mutual friend and colleague who is pregnant and whose waters broke early, forcing her to stay on hospital bedrest for nearly a month until her daughter is born (hopefully) safely. While finding the gift, my friend was unable to resist roses for herself before settling on a beautiful potted orchid for the hospital room!

Orchids used to be my absolute favorite flower, but B and I have a little cactus and succulent collection at home and they are quickly working their spiky little way into my heart. On a tangential note, I love my choice of vocation so far, but I have to admit that on beautiful days I do wish it took me outdoors more often. The flower market reminded me that all of this came from somewhere -- nurseries and farms up and down the state.

It is so grounding to smell and see all of these flowers and realize how close we are to growing things, even when we haven't seen any green leaves all day and are surrounded by buildings at work. I found some beautiful (but thorny! Ouch!) roses for Dad that I was commissioned to purchase on behalf of Mom via telephone, and some Dendrobium orchids on sale as well (couldn't resist). I also noticed a tiny little coffee shop anchoring the parking lot of the flower market, although we didn't try it so I can't recommend it one way or the other.


These cactuses are the citrus of the flower world: doesn't it cheer you up just to look at them? In all honesty, the prices were variable --some stalls were charging far more than I was willing to pay, and some seemed to be giving away flowers! Many of them are willing to negotiate, especially towards the end of the morning. I think the flower market is best suited to one of two things -- either you have a specific and unique type of flower in mind, because you are likely to find it (think black roses, miniature varieties of rare plants, organic purple cabbages masquerading as flowers), or you have a specific budget and are just looking for pretty flowers of any variety you can get. However, it's also a good place to cheer yourself up if you are ever feeling blue:

Or purple, or white, or really any color at all! Where do you go for beautiful flowers? How do you feel about cut flowers (do you love them, hate them, or buy them and feel guilty about them)? What about organically grown versus with pesticides? Do you grow your own? In any case, see you next week!