GardenCuizine: Floral Arranging

Sunday, August 23, 2026

Wonderful Visit to Ward's Flower Farm

Ward's Flower Farm

Sunflower Design Class

with Jennifer Reed

Harry and I enjoyed a wonderful visit to Ward's Flower Farm this summer to participate in a Sunflower Design Class by Jennifer Reed. I've wanted to go there for a few years now; we finally had the perfect opportunity. Ward's Farm is in scenic Mannington Township located in Salem County, New Jersey.

Their parking lot is next to their beautiful meadow featuring lots of colorful cosmos with butterflies fluttering about. Allen, one of the owners, gave us a brief history of their farm and walked us down the leading path to tour the grounds. He explained some of their plantings.

I wish I knew the variety of white asters they grow. They were a lovely touch to the gorgeous floral arrangements that we made.

Allen and his wife market their business on social media. That was how I first learned about them. The link to their website is below to learn more. They note on their website that they started with vegetables then switched over to farming mainly flowers and farm a little over 11 acres.

I've always loved driving through Salem; it's surrounded by lots of open space and preserved farm land. Like many Jersey farmers, their neighboring farm was growing soybeans. Ms Ward was sick on the day we visited, so we did not get to meet her. Allen gave us the tour and picked the flowers for the group.

It rained during our visit, but we did need the rain, the group in attendance didn't seem to mind. They had a large hoop house for cover that they use for weddings and parties. That was where floral designer Jennifer Reed awaited for us so she could start the Sunflower Design Class.

Jennifer of Jennifer's Designs does amazing floral designs. She has won many accolades from designing large scale award winning displays, including most recently, best in show at The Philadelphia Flower Show! She was also lead floral designer at The First Lady's Luncheon and the Grammys Red Carpet!

Wow! How lucky to have Jennifer share her talent with us right here in South Jersey. I can't write about all of her many achievements to do them justice, best for you to visit her website for more information about her very accomplished floral designer background.

The tour at Ward's Flower Farm included a stroll to admire flower fields; a honey bee area; and a pond that must make a lovely wedding backdrop in photos. We walked over a bridge over the pond to see the sunflower patch and another huge flower field in the distance where they grow dahlias and other flower varieties.

We were provided with everything from the wide mouth glass vase to pruners and gorgeous fresh picked flowers to design individual, large floral arrangements. I loved that the designer uses a lazy Susan to spin the arrangement while designing! This reminded me of my pastry chef cake designs. Why didn't I ever think of that for our church flower guild arrangements?

Jennifer taught us to start out with greens fanned along the vase base; we included Baker Ferns and Lemon leaf greens. Then we positioned about 5 sunflowers around the bottom atop of the greens, followed by solidago filler. We added another layer of sunflowers around midpoint, and a center sunflower to set the height.

Additional accents included: white zinnias and asters, greenhouse-grown blue-grey eucalyptus, asparagus fern, and bright orange marigolds to complete the arrangement. The sturdy stemmed, large, yellow, sunflowers were the highlight.

Jennifer pointed out that according to a study, the color yellow may bring positive results to hospitalized patients. Yellow is very cheery and uplifting!

To complete our NJ adventure, when we got home, we cooked Jersey Corn and fried Jersey tomatoes for dinner! I forget what our protein was, but we did have protein too, of course, to balance out the dinner.

Almost forgot to show you this brief pic of a spotted horse seen on their street at a neighbor's farm as we left Ward's farm. If a horse could be a dalmatian, this one was! It looks like a Leopard Appaloosa horse breed, which I've never seen before.

Thanks for reading!

Stay tuned for a post of what's growing in our garden, coming next.

Happy Gardening!

-Diana

Related Links

Largest Acquisition of NJ Farmland

Wards Farm history

Jennifer Designs PHS Best in Show 2025

Jennifer Designs

Monday, March 11, 2019

Spring is in the air! @PhilaFlowerShow #flowerpower @PHSGardening @FTDWorldCup2019

Philadelphia Flower Show
2019

Did you attend this year's Philadelphia Flower Show? Harry and I went on Friday. The show ran from March 2 - 10, 2019 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

A highlight this year for us was the new amateur photography competition! We will be sure to enter in 2020! As for the rest of the show?

In comparing 2019 with past shows, at first, we were disappointed. It seemed like there was more open space. I thought PHS could have done so much more with the theme "Flower Power". My expectation of Flower Power was different than PHS's intent.

My interpretation of the "Flower Power" theme was all about the late '60's, early '70's anti-Vietnam war movement, which was indeed captured in a few displays. We joined the crowds who gravitated to take selfies and photos in front of a huge, floral studded (sunflowers and roses etc), PEACE sign and the City of Brotherly LOVE exhibits.

Another display that fit my expectation of "Flower Power" had a glistening guitar in a purple plant arrangement on a colorful, tie-die table cloth featuring a Jimmy Hendrix album. I guess we expected more music, peace signs and tie die. And, maybe even a flower power painted VW beetle. Instead, we saw a brand new, dreamy, white Subaru.

Indeed, there was more to it; "Flower Power" was not just about the Flower Power movement. That was only a part of the big picture.

The 2019 Philadelphia Flower Show theme was also about how flowers inspire and enrich our lives in ways of healing, community, hope, transformation and peace.

Upon learning that, the very touching Sara's Smiles foundation exhibit all made more sense as to fitting in perfectly with the theme. The story of little Sara is sad. She passed away at age 5 from brain cancer. Sara's Smiles foundation helps other children battling cancer.

I also found it fascinating to learn about the presenting sponsor, Main Line Health. They include the healing power of plants at their facilities. Patients can experience a wellness garden and a sensory garden with aromatherapy. Wow! All hospitals should consider doing this.

Photo by Harry Wind

The big "missed it..." for us at the 2019 Philadelphia Flower show was that we walked right by PHS's major event feature - the FTD World Cup! How did we miss this? When we walked in to the staging area it was dimly lit with TV monitors high overhead and adjacent to the stage; unfortunately, we didn't stay long enough to learn what was happening.

Turns out, what was happening was the most major event for floral designers around the world; the FTD World's Cup! The event had not been held in the US since 1985 so it was a big deal for Philadelphia.

Floral designers traveled from 23 countries to compete. Bart Hassam of Australia won with his gorgeous arrangements. His largest display featured green blooms and heleconia. To see more, take a look at the below videos with Swedish floral designer/Master of Ceremonies, Per Benjamin and Alicia Vitarelli from channel 6.

Hervé Frézal from France used lots of asparagus in his organic design. And, the Mexican designer, Leopoldo Gómez, incorporated another favorite of mine, protea, in his design. He also used dried gourds for his flower vases rather than the more commonly used glass tubes.