Nothing like a little dirt on your hands and some good food to help you enjoy an evening of fun. Last night the store hosted it's first "new" style workshop to amazing success. The theme of the evening was Southwest Desert: the art of raising cacti and succulents. Below is the table setup in the shop prior to guests arriving and I realize at the end of the night I didn't get a shot of the food because we were too busy eating the churro chips with fruit salsa and black lager chicken flautas to take any photos of it. I did however get a bunch of good shots of the tablescape to share with you and the take home planters our guest received as they finished off the night.
The table was set in all blue and gold tones with a touch of copper. Cactus planters, candles and a little fall nature add the final touch.
With a backdrop of pillows of course. One day sometime in the future [the list is a mile long but dreams never hurt anyone] I hope to have a dedicated workshop space for these types of events that doesn't require us to bust down a part of the store and therefore allows us to hold them more frequently. At most currently we can hold 8 maybe 10 people if we really squish which keeps the workshop intimate but also means we sell out quicker due to space constraints. After this class, I believe a dishwasher was added to that wish list last night by my wonderful kick ass employees.
Each guest received their own table setting for nibbling, a workshop note area and of course wine glass to enjoy some refreshments. This style of workshop is new for us because of the less hands on approach the actual guest has. In previous workshops Jill and I found that while everyone was interested they were so busy "doing" they missed a lot of the information and instruction which didn't lead to the success they were hoping for with their planter. There was also stress because of worry they were doing it wrong or not actually enjoying the dirt part. We removed this part of the class so that everyone could freely eat, listen and ask questions. They saw their planters being made and still got to choose the actual planter for their home and the decorative touches but without the worry of doing it themselves.
This class had 7 planters to choose from for their take home piece and for the first time everyone chose a different planter. It was awesome to see all of them finished and for the guests to see each piece transformed from a simple pot to finished decorative piece.
This class was a simple take-home cactus piece that will be extremely low maintenance for our attendees.
Future workshops will include orchid care, black thumb nights, Christmas arrangements and more..... The ideas are endless as long as my energy keeps up.
Enjoy your day everyone
Meg
