The festive season has been declared open and the winter chill is setting in — a perfect excuse to host smart parties at home. And when it comes to doing up your place for a party, nothing can beat the elegance of fresh flower arrangements. 

“I believe that apart from beautifying inner spaces, flowers help in absorbing negativity,” says Baisakhi Ghosh, one of Calcutta’s leading floral artists who specialises in weddings and events and is associated with top five-star hotels around the country. 

The floral business is on an upswing says Baisakhi. “People prefer organic, fresh flowers instead of artificial ones to decorate their homes and spaces,” she says. Adds Romit, Baisakhi’s son who joined his mother’s business three years back: “Our schedule is jam-packed during this festive season for doing floral decorations in hotels, for events and parties.” He adds that they work on a “250-300 event calendar a year” and have recently ventured into complete interior space solutions.

Here are a few simple and easy-on-the-pocket (it won’t cost you more than Rs 1,000 or so) DIY tips from Baisakhi and Romit to decorate your home with floral arrangements to impress your party crowd. 

Tip 1: Let there be light 

“The combination of flowers and lights spells magic,” says Baisakhi. In this set-up, you wrap rice lights (small string lights) around a wire in a swirling pattern, and place it inside two broad and transparent cylindrical glass vases of different heights. Then place glass lids on the vases on which you place fish bowls filled three-fourth with water. Bunch up fresh yellow roses and place them in the bowls. Light the bulbs for a spectacular sight. “The best thing about this installation is that you might not require additional lighting in your room or the lawns,” says Romit, 26, who’s the CEO of Baisakhi Flowers. You can place the installation even on low tables inside your room. 

Perk it up: “To enhance the look, you could place some more flowers around the base and inside the bowls. You could replace the roses with anthuriums too,” says Romit. 

Best suited for: Rooftops, terraces, gardens. 

Tip 2: Build up an illusion 

If you wish to stun your guests with a floral installation that’s also a visual illusion, go for this set-up that the mother-son team calls The Zero Gravity Arrangement. Pick up eight to 10 18-inch, thin glass tubes and tie them together with nylon threads. Make sure to bunch them at varying levels. Insert tulips inside the tubes and hang them from a hook in the ceiling using nylon threads. “The trick is to make sure there’s no up-lighting,” advises Romit. “Only then it will seem as if the flowers are suspended in thin air.” 

Perk it up: “Wind rice lights around the glass tubes and also insert some in the glasses. You can also go for other flowers like coloured lilies, orchids and phalaenopsis,” says Romit. 

Best suited for: Central arrangement, corners where people won’t crowd around it.

Tip 3: Creativity’s inside your kitchen 

“You can find creativity in your own kitchen,” smiles Baisakhi. In this arrangement, she uses fruits and veggies to jazz up a floral set-up. Take red apples and yellow capsicums, make narrow holes top down and scoop out the pulp using a carving knife or even a peeler. Insert long-stemmed flowers like anthuriums and bird of paradise (BOP) inside slim glass tubes and place them inside the holes so that it looks as if the flowers are blooming out of the fruits and veggies. “One could look at it as an appetite enhancer and it can also be used to decorate starter trays,” says Romit. The best thing? “You can re-use the fruits and vegetables,” says Baisakhi. 

Perk it up: “You can go for more exotic fruits like kiwis and more expensive flowers like proteas and cabbage flowers,” says Romit. Adds Baisakhi: “A decorative tray will be a nice touch.”

Best suited for: Dining tables and open kitchens. 

Tip 4: Enliven your corners 

Corners. They are so boring, right? “Not really, if you add character to each one,” says Baisakhi. The low-on-expectation space in your room can be turned into something surprisingly pretty and eye-catching — which is a cakewalk if you are using flowers, says Baisakhi. So, get a carpenter to build a small wooden frame (in pic left) with three holes to insert 2.5-foot hollow glass tubes. Inside them place standing heliconias. Simple, yet classy. “Flowers like heliconias add a burst of colour to dull corners, are quite grand and are able to hold their own,” says Romit.

Perk it up: “Add some Monstera deliciosa leaves to give it a tropical touch,” says Romit. 

Best suited for: Oh-so-boring corners.

Tip 5: Recycle 

Listen up, beer guzzlers. Instead of throwing away those beer bottles after downing the good stuff, why not recycle them and use them to decorate your interiors? Just fill around five or six pint-sized bottles — be it coloured or transparent — three-fourths with water and tie them up (from the neck till halfway down the bottles) with hemp rope. Use the same to string the bottles together as well. “The hemp rope is used to lend an arty and earthy effect,” points out Baisakhi. Insert gypsophila flowers in a way that the stems are concealed by the rope. 

Perk it up: “You can tie them up from one corner of the room to another and use them as hanging installations. Also, to add an effect, slip in some foliage, marbles or pebbles inside the bottles,” says Romit. 

Best suited for: A bar set-up or a rack arrangement.

Photographs by Subhendu Chaki