In an extravagant flurry of petals, flowing grasses and florist’s twine, Madrid Blooms 2026 swept into the Spanish capital final week (28-30 January) on the Palacio de Santa Bárbara. Now in its third 12 months, the worldwide floral design congress gathers high floral designers and artists from across the globe to share – and showcase – their skills with attendees, who paid as much as €3,190 for a three-day ticket. The viewers included professionals, suppliers and lovers alike.
Madrid Bloom attendees work alongside masters and collaborate on large-scale installations, resembling this one led by Victoria Clausen Floral
We dwell in an period wherein floral artists, lengthy orbiting the world of movie star, have turn out to be stars in their very own proper, commanding huge social media followings. At Madrid Blooms, the line-up included Bryce Heyworth of September Studio, a designer and digital creator with greater than 1.6 million followers who has labored with Kourtney Kardashian and types together with Lexus, The North Face and Armani; Mikey Putnam of Rosandich, the floral designer behind Gwyneth Paltrow’s wedding ceremony; and Lilo Klinkenberg of Studio Lilo, whose sculptural compositions have appeared in initiatives for Jil Sander and Cartier.
Pageant founder and director Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins is a former journalist, now a flower educator, and the proprietor of Madrid Flower Faculty
In accordance with Grand View Analysis, the worldwide lower flower market is prospering, valued at $39bn in 2024 and anticipated to surpass $51bn by 2030. We sat down with pageant founder and director Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins – a journalist-turned-flower educator, and the proprietor of Madrid Flower Faculty – to seek out out why floristry is a world we ought to be paying nearer consideration to.
Bryce Heyworth of Sydney-based September Studio is a designer and digital creator with greater than 1.6 million followers, who has labored with manufacturers together with Lexus, The North Face and Armani
Wallpaper*: How did Madrid Blooms begin?
Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins: The convention is a loopy concept I had in thoughts for years, which got here to fruition after I ran into the director of Madrid Design Pageant. Pili Fuentes, from Flower Home Mexico, was additionally there in the beginning.
With solely 4 months to go, I despatched out seven invites to vital floral designers, pondering that some would say no. To my shock, all of them stated they’d come, and since then, seven designers have been included within the official programme.
A collaborative set up that includes lemons and yellow chrysanthemums was created by September Studio finally week’s version of Madrid Blooms
In 2025, the convention was held on the Casa de México. Working surrounded by first-class crafts was pure inspiration. This 12 months we moved to the Palacio Santa Bárbara: an area full of sunshine and extra sq. footage within the centre of Madrid. And as soon as once more, we offered out.
Mikey Putnam of Rosandich led a workshop titled ‘The Artwork of the Color Conflict’
W*: Are you able to inform us in regards to the programme?
SBG: On the primary day, lectures and dwell demonstrations by the designers; on the second day, two three-hour workshops; and on the third day, college students work on a large-scale floral set up, which may be visited by the general public the next day. Every participant can take lessons with three designers. My purpose is for every particular person to be taught as a lot as attainable, and even higher whether it is outdoors their consolation zone.
Madrid’s Palacio de Santa Bárbara served because the venue for this 12 months’s occasion
The designers fluctuate from 12 months to 12 months and are available from a listing of suggestions and discussions with the Madrid Flower Faculty workforce, which organises the occasion. This course of is the longest and most tough. The chosen designers should have an authentic inventive language, a special strategy, and be good academics. One in all them needs to be native, Spanish or international, however with a profession in Spain.
Then comes the duty of acquiring all of the botanical materials they want – we now have even been requested for artichoke leaves. In winter, the number of flowers is proscribed, and our relationship with flower growers and wholesalers in America and Europe has been key.
Studio Lilo led a workshop on pruning surreal sculptures titled ‘The Desk as Canvas: Flowers as Creative Medium’
W*: What’s new for 2026?
SBG: We’ve got a document variety of sponsors, we now have added a mini-fair, and, as traditional, we now have a star sustainable product. One other addition we’re introducing this 12 months is knowledgeable networking breakfast for our sponsors and native and worldwide figures within the floral design trade, to encourage long-term relationships to type at our congress.
It is a demanding state of affairs as a result of the attendees are additionally designers with a enterprise up and working. They’re in search of inspiration, but in addition new strategies and particular data. With 17 nationalities within the earlier two editions, we now have jumped to twenty-eight this 12 months and 4 continents, America, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. Individuals are coming from Japanese Europe and a big contingent from Brazil. Final 12 months, we had college students from Alaska to South Africa, together with Ghana.
Studio Lilo’s massive scale set up was this sinuous pink archway
W*: At what level does floral design transfer past ornament and turn out to be an artwork type?
SBG: I feel [floral] artists have all the time existed, however now we see them. Floral design is an ephemeral artwork that has expanded exponentially for 2 causes: social media, particularly Instagram, and technological improvement – at the moment you’ll be able to take a superb photograph along with your telephone and improve it with an app. I can discover out what a florist is doing in her workshop in Bangkok after which see what’s taking place in one other workshop in Brooklyn.
‘Floral design has expanded exponentially for 2 causes: social media, particularly Instagram, and technological improvement’
Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins, founder and director Madrid Blooms
W*: What shifts have you ever noticed in botanical design over the previous decade?
SBG: It is humorous, however ten years in the past I used to be residing in New York and beginning my journey with flowers. As a journalist, I used to be amazed at how geography and tradition influenced designs. Russians liked extra-large bouquets. Australia had a fascination with unique flowers. Spain was obsessive about longevity and opted for dried flowers. America was experiencing its most romantic period with Backyard Type. New York and London, as all the time, had been islands the place something was allowed.
Matagalán is a famend Barcelona-based floral design studio based by Chilean-born artist Carolina Spencer recognized for its ikebana-inspired designs
At this time, nonetheless, geographical boundaries now not exist as a result of the world is linked. Consider the craze for pampas grass a number of years in the past.
It has all the time been tough to seek out your area of interest and keep true to your type. It’s tempting to repeat what already works, however in case you do not transfer on from that stage shortly, it’s a unhappy sight to see on social media. It’s a must to grasp the principles after which overlook them. Solely then are you able to create one thing excellent and thrilling. Scale and form do not matter, so long as they reply to what you need to talk.
‘It’s a must to grasp the principles after which overlook them. Solely then are you able to create one thing excellent and thrilling’
Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins, founder and director Madrid Blooms
When floral designers create an association with the intention of speaking that means by way of their supplies, they invite us to really feel one thing and to mirror on what we’re seeing, like we might with some other creative medium. Flowers turn out to be a uncooked materials by way of which floral artists develop and discover their very own visible language, bringing their very own inventive proposal to their work is what makes it an artwork type, and we’re seeing this motion in works in museums, occasions and the world of promoting.
‘My purpose is for every particular person to be taught as a lot as attainable, and even higher whether it is outdoors their consolation zone,’ Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins tells Wallpaper*
W*: Sustainability is commonly cited, however what does accountable observe really appear like on the luxurious finish of floristry at the moment?
SBG: We’re experiencing the perfect part, because the trade has lastly accepted {that a} rising variety of florists and clients now not want to contribute to air pollution. If you concentrate on it, it’s utterly illogical that we, who extract essentially the most stunning issues from nature, return a bit of plastic that can stay for the following hundred years.
People are investing money and time in creating biodegradable options resembling Oshun Pouch, Phoam Labs (each plant-based floral foam alternate options), and OLMS Bamboo Floral (an organization making compostable water tubes and bamboo floral sticks). And huge corporations are additionally transferring in that path. The true luxurious is having a clear planet.
Famend German floral designer and educator Gregor Lersch led a workshop on ‘Natural Development’
W*: What themes, supplies or botanical instructions at this 12 months’s version finest sign the place the way forward for floral design is heading?
SBG: Modern design is the language now, and I see that it nonetheless has a protracted option to go. It’s a considerate design, with a stable basis within the ideas of Ikebana. Every little thing is intentional: the selection and amount of supplies, the juxtaposition of botanical components, the clear and clear kinds.
‘Flowers resembling carnations, which had been as soon as regarded down upon, now tackle significance due to their texture. At this time we marvel on the majestic type of Lilium longiflorum, when earlier than we might solely think about them on a coffin’
Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins, founder and director Madrid Blooms
Flowers resembling carnations, which had been as soon as regarded down upon, now tackle significance due to their texture. A small and delicate Ixia Highlight takes centre stage as a result of it now not fills gaps in preparations. At this time, we marvel on the majestic type of Lilium longiflorum, when earlier than we might solely think about them on a coffin. Now, the floral volumes climb the surfaces of museums, and transcend weddings and occasions.
This 12 months, the novelty comes from the Ecuadorian tropics. [Ecuadorian supplier] Magic Flowers sends us 85 forms of unique flowers and leaves, resembling musas, raulianas, and hibiscus.
Gregor Lersch blended Arundo arundinaria bamboo with pink amaryllis blooms on this large-scale set up
W*: Lastly, what do you suppose is driving the renewed urge for food for lower flowers at the moment?
SBG: I feel making a bouquet is one thing nearly instinctive for human beings. We lengthy for nature, we lengthy for its scents, colors, and textures. That is why each time we go by a flower store, it is so onerous to not depart with a bouquet. Much more so in cities with little inexperienced area. For me, New York is the perfect instance. Search for a flower store on a map of Manhattan and you will quickly see a pink spot protecting the island.
Paulina Nieliwocki of New Jersey-based studio Blue Jasmine Floral led a workshop on creating ‘neo backyard centrepieces’
I feel the opening {of professional} faculties and conferences resembling Madrid Blooms has quite a bit to do with this need to be taught floral design. Within the case of Madrid Flower Faculty, I imagine that displaying preparations beneath creative path modifications our notion of what’s attainable with flowers.
‘I imagine that displaying preparations beneath creative path modifications our notion of what’s attainable with flowers’
Sylvia Bustamante Gubbins, founder and director Madrid Blooms
And at last, how a lot enjoyable it’s to find new varieties. The primary time I noticed a Lilium martagon, I used to be mesmerised; I used to be satisfied it was a brand new selection. Every week later, I found that flower in an 18th-century lithograph. Gerberas weren’t amongst my favorite flowers till spider gerberas appeared. And now there are micro ones, smaller than mini ones! It is a pleasant and interesting world.
Supply: Wallpaper
