Laetitia Mayor: The Pioneer in Sustainable Weddings

Florésie's Laetitia Mayor on Crafting Luxury Sustainable Weddings ahead of MADRID BLOOMS.

Could you tell us a bit about how you started in the world of floral design? What was your first job? 

Kind of by accident actually, I used to be an engineer in the medical device industry and at some point in my career I was a little bored and needed a vacation. So I signed up for the School of Florists in Paris, and I thought it would be a little break and I would do something with my hands, I never thought I was going to have a professional career as a florist. So that’s how it started, I basically fell in love with flowers. They are addictive and I got addicted to them. When I was at the school I started to write my blog, where I was telling my friends and family what I was doing, and I called my blog Florésie. Which stands for flowers and ‘hérésie’, because I was an engineer doing flowers, which was somewhat ‘hérétique’ (heretic), so that’s how I came up with the name. I signed up for a month program, when I came back I realized that a lot of people were reading my blog, and I got contacted by a Swiss magazine, and they told me, “I love your blog, we want you to create content for us”, and that was my first paid job as a florist. 

How did you get into the wedding industry?

I founded my company in 2012 in France. My husband and I bought a house with a garden, and I was very naive and thought I could grow the flowers I would use for the weddings, so I started a cut flower garden, and it gained attention very quickly. It was very much what people were looking for at the time and I got a lot of success very fast. But I exhausted myself, it was crazy growing and doing weddings, and I wasn’t doing luxury weddings, it was small weddings, so I wasn’t really making any money with that. I was working like crazy and not making money out of it. I did that for a couple of years, maybe 2 or 3. Then I thought, I need to change something. That’s when I got the chance to go to a workshop with Bows and Arrows from Texas who do beautiful flowers, it’s insane you need to check it out, they came to France and taught a workshop and it opened my eyes to the market of higher end weddings and luxury flowers. Also how to use social media, they were very well into Instagram, which was new for us in France. That’s when it all started, I thought I was to change my clientèle and go to international customers, and it took me two years to pivot, and that’s what we do now. 

Are there specific themes, colors, or elements that you find yourself repeatedly drawn to in your work? 

Garden roses! I am a sucker for garden roses. I think from the beginning I was very drawn to garden style when it comes to flowering. I really love garden flowers, garden roses especially. In terms of colors, I’m very drawn to subtle color combinations. Unfortunately I cannot do that for all my clients because some of them have very specific ideas about the color pallet they want. What I most enjoy is when I can create the color pallet myself. That’s the most fun, but it’s not always the case. Very often they have an event designer that works for them.

"Happiness! When I do weddings, what I want is for my work to transmit happiness."

Who or what are your main sources of inspiration? 

You’re going to laugh … but one of my main inspirations is Ariella Chezar, I think she’s one of the best. When Sylvia told me she was coming to MADRID BLOOMS I was like, are you kidding me? She was one of the first florists whose work I have been drawn to. In the very beginning as well, Sarah Winward, whose business used to be called Honey of A Thousand Flowers. At the time I loved Saipua , Nicolette used to work with them a lot. Those were my very first styles.

What has been the most significant learning experience in your career as a floral designer? 

That’s a tough one … We do events, only events, and events are particular because there’s always something that happens, even if you plan everything, things don’t go the way you planned. It’s always like that. What being a florist in events has taught me is that it always turns out okay. Mother nature provides. If we need something, if we miss something, we can always forage, we can always find a solution, nature surrounding us is so vast and there are so many things available, it always works out in the end. That’s the biggest learning for me, it helps me sleep at night. 

Are there any emerging trends or innovative techniques that you find particularly exciting? 

Oh my gosh, yes! In the event industry we follow the trends in fashion. Right now seeing flowers that are very sculptural, which is like the style you have at Madrid Flower School, which I find very inspiring. That’s exciting, and it’s fun to design. My team loves that. Another thing I am drawn to right now, is what is happening in Korea. The style is very interesting, delicate, and I love the movement. So I’m very drawn to that work at the moment. If you want to survive in the event industry you need to evolve with the styles, you can’t just have one style and then never evolve, so it’s one of my jobs is to keep up with what is going on, make sure we are adapting with what people want in the events. 

What specific sustainable practices do you incorporate into your daily work as a floral designer? 

We try to be as sustainable as possible, of course we use our structures, it would be stupid not to! When it comes to installation we use them as much as possible. When it comes to centerpieces we love to use floral frogs, from the U.S. To be honest there are still some things we do with foam because we have no solution yet, also because of the scale of what we do, if we were doing smaller weddings we would definitely be able to do everything foam free, but at the scale that we do it, it’s sometimes really hard to find solutions that are viable and realistic. Also because of the flowers that need specific treatments. We are keep working on trying to find foam free solutions for those moments we still use it, we want to find solutions for everything! We’re just not there yet. Every time there is a new product that comes out I test it, sometimes we use Agra Wool. We try to make it work. So, we’ll see! 

When people enjoy your floral designs, what message or emotion do you hope they take away?

Happiness! When I do weddings, what I want is for my work to transmit happiness. Even though we do luxury weddings, people are very elegant, and everything is refined and everything, but I think happiness is what I want to convey with my flowers.