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Australia's Original Instagram Secondhand Furniture Seller
Over the last few years, the secondhand furniture re-selling market in Australia has really blown up. Instagram has been a major part of this – facilitating countless new vintage furniture sellers, who scour platforms like Gumtree, eBay and auction houses to find covetable pieces, then restore, re-photograph and sell their finds (sometimes within seconds!) via social media.
Pip Newell of Curated Spaces was there at the start of it all. We chat with the OG Instagram seller to find out how she grew her business from her living room in Melbourne, to encompass a network of more than 20 sellers across Australia in the space of just three years
https://thedesignfiles.net/2020/10/shopping-curated-spaces/
When she discovered her stalwart supplier, Soho Rose Farm, was suffering from event cancellations and lost bookings, Gina sprang into action. Photo – Dan Roberts.
Buy A Bunch couldn’t be further from the work I regularly do,’ explains Gina Lasker, the Melbourne florist behind floral studio Georgie Boy. Gina usually specialises in events, but after the suspension of public and private gatherings in Victoria, she knew her business model needed to take a quick, sharp turn. For the time being at least.
‘A few people mentioned that they would love to send or receive a bunch of flowers right now while they’re housebound, but I really wasn’t convinced there was enough demand,’ Gina recalls. ‘It wasn’t until I spoke to my growers and suppliers about the devastating effects of the pandemic on their businesses, that I decided I would take it week by week and see if this was a service people wanted.’
And sure enough, it was. Gina’s bouquets have sold out every week since the launch of Buy A Bunch, a home delivery service bringing her imaginative floral arrangements to people’s doorsteps. Her bunches are rich, romantic and wild, with clusters of dahlias next to roses and hydrangeas, along with more unusual blooms such as chrysanthemums and lupin flowers. Though her distinct style is usually reserved for large event installations, bringing vivid, vibrant floral arrangements into people’s homes on a smaller scale has proved just as thriving. The flip has been so successful, in fact, that Gina has even expanded her offering to include larger bunches and a collaboration with local cakemaker Fig + Salt for an upcoming Mother’s Day hamper!
Gina’s longstanding supplier is Soho Rose Farm, an independent flower farm on the outskirts of Creswick Regional Park, who Gina credits as an invaluable resource to Victoria’s florist industry. When the pandemic hit, Gina immediately reached out to Kristy Tippett of Soho Rose Farm – ‘I knew I wanted to include her roses and some of the more unusual flowers she grows like stripe or single-petal dahlias,’ Gina says. With the litany of cancelled events and postponed gatherings sprawling endlessly into the future, Kristy and her fields of wasted flowers were happy to accomodate Gina’s orders. It was a win-win for all!
Working with her partner, photographer Dan Roberts, Gina staged photo shoots of her arrangements in her home, and began hand delivering bunches to people’s doorsteps every week. ‘People are ordering for themselves as much as they are for others, which has also been a nice realisation. It’s been a nice reminder how much joy flowers bring to people!’
As a practice, Gina has been running Georgie Boy since 2015. Off the back of working with some of the greats (Saskia Havekes of Grandiflora, Cecilia Fox and Katie Marx), Gina developed her own arc of floral expression that allowed her to sit comfortably with those she trained under and admired. Though she takes inspiration from many, Georgie Boy’s arrangements are totally Gina’s own. Her events installations are abundant and rambling, a considered chaos that resembles the organised patterns of the wild, natural world. ‘I focus on depth and movement most,’ she says of her arrangements, combining differences in height, colour and texture to allow the natural form of the flowers to speak for themselves, while also evoking emotion.
‘The best thing about the work I do is how varied it can be. It’s physically, emotionally and mentally stimulating, and takes me to some incredible places’ she says.
Want to brighten up your home with one of Gina’s bunches? Head to Georgie Boy to order a bunch, if there are any left!
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