Today we’d like to introduce you to Evgeniya Bannikova.
Hi Evgeniya, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
My flower’s story began a year ago, in February 2021. I’ve started to work in Sage Sisters flower shop without any florist background experience. Sage Sisters gave me a lot of opportunities and I realized how much l love flowers how interesting it is to be a florist. Most things about flowers I learned while working there. Also, I take a lot of online classes about floral design by florists around the world (from France, Russia, Argentine, the USA, etc. ).
I’m looking for my own unique style. I like to study different ways of arranging flowers and try to use all this knowledge when creating floral designs for events, weddings, or flower installations for hotels and restaurants.
My small floral studio is located in my garage now and I spend all my free time there playing with flowers and creating something interesting for my clients. I’m really happy when I get feedback from my customers about my job. I believe flowers make people happy and I can see it.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Before I’ve started to work with flowers, I thought that the florist was so “romantic” profession. You just need to arrange flowers, create something beautiful, smell roses all day long. Now I know that is not true at all. If you want to be a florist, be prepared to spend most of the time processing flowers, cleaning your workspace, washing buckets, cleaning your workspace again, lifting heavy bunches of flowers, standing on your feet all day long. It’s hard but anyway, I enjoy this process because I know that without it, there won’t be any result.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I specialize in creating custom bouquets, flower arrangements, floral decor for weddings and different events. My favorite type of arrangement is what we call “Florist choice”. I like to use wildflowers. Now, I learn about floral interior design for restaurants and hotels. This is what I want to do more in the future.
Also, I am so proud of my art projects with local photographers. I always like to create something unusual, collaborating with them. We come up with some crazy ideas and bring them to life. For example, I embroidered a jacket with flowers for our last photoshoot. I enjoyed the result so much.
All these art projects inspired me to create floral decorations for music videos, tv-shows, movies, or fashion shows. I dream one day it will come true.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Yes, I think I can say that I’m a risk-taking person. I worked in a Russian company more than ten years as an appraiser. It was a stable office job. One day risk it all: I quit my job, moved to San Diego, and realized that I didn’t know what to do. But I knew one thing I didn’t want to be the appraiser anymore. I wanted to try something new.
No more office work.
I sent my resume to Sage Sisters flower shop, in a few weeks they invited me for an interview and hired me after (lucky me it was St. Valentine’s day season and they needed extra help really bad).
Am I a risk-taken person? I don’t know.
But “If you don’t take risks, you don’t drink champagne”.
Pricing:
- Bouquets – starting at $60
- Arrangements – starting at $80
- Wedding bouquets – starting at $100
Contact Info:
- Email: jannyfk@gmail.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/freshflowersociety
Image Credits
@Guzartphotography @Mariadavisphoto
