Flowers Design School
The Flowers Design School was established in 1994 by Eva Maria Herb-Goodwin. The school offers a range of courses from entry level foundation skills to nationally recognised qualifications in floristry. They also offer a program for international students, as well as professional development and industry workshops targeting design trends and leadership skills for the Australasian market.
Background
The Flowers Design School is run by a team of industry experts, including German master florists, award winning local designers and qualified small business experts.
Flowers Design School offers the Certificate II, III and IV in Floristry. The Flowers Design School trains approximately 230 students per year in a mixture of qualification courses and short course formats.
In addition to recognised training, Flowers Design School offers day and night classes in Bridal Design, Creative and Commercial Floristry, Advanced European Design, private tuition, and professional development for retail florists and leisure courses.
Innovation
The Flowers Design School has welded compliance with the Australian Quality Training Framework to industry engagement and progression of professional knowledge. The result is a strong professional business.
In an effort to keep abreast of the latest trends and moves in the floristry industry, the team travels to Europe frequently, making contact with world experts such as Gregor Lersch, an acknowledged authority in the industry. Over the past decade Flowers Design School attracted Gregor to Australia four times in conjunction with the West Australian wildflower season to be a guest lecturer at industry workshops and host wildflowers tours.
Flowers Design School also maintains a significant and growing library and specialised bookshop containing international publications on floristry that are normally difficult to source in Australia. It is the largest of its kind in Australia and continues to position Flowers Design School as a leading school in the region.
Flowers Design School has an active database in Australia of over 6,000 contacts and a growing overseas database. This provides a communication pathway into the wider industry that is the cornerstone of future growth particularly in the publications and workshops area.
Contact with industry is maintained through workshops, holding floristry demonstrations for industry, guest speaking through Interflora, Professional Flower Association of New South Wales, and being a member of Flower Design Australia. Once a year the school conducts a series of unique trend focused workshops touring Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Brisbane, as well as Jakarta (Indonesia), Kuching (Malaysia) and at times Kuala Lumper and Singapore.
The school maintains contact with designers in Europe and more intensively in Germany, conducts forums on teaching strategies and analysis of new publications from around the world.
The team at Flowers Design School are in high demand as consultants in the industry and Flowers Design School is seen as the trend leader in the industry. More importantly students of Flowers Design School benefit from having access to the latest trends and gaining an understanding of the industry from a world perspective.
Eva is on the National Industry Reference Group for the development of the training package and a member of the World Skills Industry Advisory Committee. There is a commitment to achieving excellence in the delivery of the qualifications with additional staff being sourced from Germany to ensure currency in worldwide skills in floristry.
Success
Flowers Design School is a passionate devotee of the industry and is committed to excellence in every aspect of their operation. The success of Flowers Design School comes from understanding people and diversity, being a creative strong leader and having a strong business focus across the business. Success is supported through a professional approach and a commitment to ongoing professional development of staff and continuing to develop, enhance and embrace connections with industry.
Flowers Design School team members are committed and passionate and feel empowered to achieve their potential. This is supported by having strong management: position descriptions for all staff, appropriate and timely communications and a respectful management style that encourages staff to give of their best.
Flowers Design School is well known in the Australasian floral industry for quality and unique training with a strong influence in contemporary European design. This is evidenced in the classrooms where students have access to the latest design elements and trends from Europe and Asia as a result of an intentional strategy of engagement by Eva.
This outward looking focus has assisted the Flowers Design School to become one of the more successful contemporary Australian schools servicing the floristry industry.
