Meet The 2020 International Competitors

Diana has been involved and passionate about flowers, plants and nature all her life.

As a child her interest in trees was which ones were good to climb up and make a secret place in the branches. Then she would come down and lay on the grass and try to imagine what it would be like to be a blade of grass.

Becoming involved with The Garden Club of Toronto  has proven to be one of the wonderful things she has done. It  has provided her so many friends and opportunities to learn, to teach and explore ideas.

Apart from the club quilting, felting,  ringing English Handbells, grandchildren, her busy puppy who makes sure all her steps are done everyday, the great outdoors  all keep her life fairly full.

Christine is a floral design skills developer spending most of her time talking, designing and writing about floral craftsmanship.

After studying floristry both at college and as an apprentice she received her Master Florist Accreditation in 2010. Christine has represented Canada in some of the best known flower shows and won awards here in Canada, America, the Chelsea Flower show in England, a Design Innovation award in South Africa and was named one of the most Influential Designers Today by Australia’s Flowers Across Melbourne. Last year she won an Independent Press Book Award for her first flower arranging book: The Effortless Floral Craftsman, a floral crafter’s guide to crafting with nature. Her work is widely published and shared online and used in training programs around the world.

If you recognize Christine it is probably from her floral craft website: My Creative Workbook where she shares a new floral craft design and its tutorial every week- and she has done so for 9 years straight without missing a single week!

Christine lives and works in Vancouver, beautiful British Columbia, Canada with her husband Marius

Rosemary started flower arranging circa 1988 and is a member of Irish Club and Toronto Flower and Garden Club (2005)

She has won awards at Canada Blooms and a number at National Level in Ireland.

Rosemary a Citizen of both Ireland and Canada, has three children; 2 daughters (Ireland) and 1 son Canada) and three grandchildren

Annie has been a member of “The Malta Horticulture Society” (henceforth, the “Society”) for twenty-five years. For the past ten years, she has taken upon the roles of committee member and competition judge on behalf of the Society. The latter was founded in 1903; its fundamental purpose being that of aiding the local agricultural sector throughout changes in trends it may experience. The current president of the Society is Dr Joseph Borg, C.D.H., Dip. Hort (Am.) Ph.D. (Hort.) Essex.

Since its inception, the Society has been tasked with the organisation and running of the Spring Show which is held annually. The most recent edition of the Spring Show was held in May of 2019. The competitions have been focusing namely on cut flowers, cut flowers arranged, plants in pots, ornamental plants and vegetables. As of 1921, the Spring Show has been held in the gardens of the official residence of the President of Malta, namely, San Anton Gardens in Attard, Malta.

A regular contributor for a bestseller flower magazine,Flora International Magazine for the last 15 years.

Flower shows organizer, as a member of The Malta Horticulture Society, floral demonstrator,
Author of ‘Qalb il- Fjuri’ , Kullana Kulturali by PIN publication.

We invite you to find out more about Malta, visit: www.visitmalta.com

Wiqarun-nisa Boolani has completed her master’s in microbiology. She has worked for the Aga Khan Hospital & University. She has actively been engaged for over 35 years as a volunteer, including chairperson and national member for the Aga Khan Health Services and Maternity Homes.

She has been the member of Floral Arts Society for over 14 years – she worked as the show chairperson, hon: secretary, president. Currently working as an advisor to the executive committee.

Wiquarun-nisa has participated in national and international shows and have received many awards including best innovative design award nationally. She also received 2^nd prize at the world show in Boston, USA, and 1^st prize at the World Show Barbados. She has given demonstrations nation-wide.

Her husband works for an international hotel group as the CEO, whereas Wiquarun-nisa has two married children, her daughter works for Capital One and her son works for Royal Bank of Canada. Her younger son completed his graduation from University of Ottawa.

Carola Kean is from Great Britain. She lives in a very rural area of Herefordshire, in the heart of the Midlands, with her husband Gordon.  This is where I was born and brought up. (She has a very broad Herefordshire accent!)  She and her family are fortunate enough to be able to grow or own vegetables and fruit, keep bees and Gordon has a small vineyard providing them with wine!

Carola is a National Demonstrator for the National Association of Flower Societies (NAFAS). She has travelled far and wide demonstrating floral design and, also competing in NAFAS national and WAFA shows gaining awards and loving every moment. She was awarded two seconds in the last world show in Barbados.  Her largest audience to demonstrate to was 1,000 when she was asked to demonstrate for a NASFAS national show.  What a lot of work but the excitement was exhilarating.

She has had the great pleasure of arranging flowers in Westminster Abbey on two occasions which was a great honour.

She has done a lot of fundraising over the last 16 years for our local hospice charity. The last event held as a flower festival last September raised over £65,000.

She is looking forward to her visit to Canada in Bloom and sharing my passion for flowers

Kathy has been doing floral design for 20 years now.  As a member of Peachtree GC, she routinely presents floral design programs to interested members. She also creates arrangements for charity functions in the Atlanta area.  As a judge herself, she is also currently mentoring a number of women who are working to become floral design judges.  She has won several the top awards in the Philadelphia Flower Show as well as awards from other shows across the country.  Recently, along with winning a blue ribbon at a flower show in Milwaukee at the Harley Davidson Museum, she also won the curator’s award.  That unusual award was made from a crankshaft for a Harley Davidson motorcycle. She will be presented with a medal at the upcoming GCA 2020 annual meeting for consistently innovative design.

Kathy has two children and four grandchildren. Her two oldest grandchildren compete internationally in tennis and the younger of the two has been arranging with me in Philadelphia for the past four years. In 2019, they were presented with an award for the best arrangement of the 2019 show. That parallel arrangement included hundreds of used and cut tennis strings that were woven into the bases of the supporting structures. They were even able to use some of Maria Sharapova’s old strings in the arrangement for good luck. She likes to make use of unusual materials in my arrangements.  That tends to give the arrangements a sense of whimsy.

Along with arranging in the western style, She received her initial teachers status in Sogestu 18 months ago. She very much enjoys this style of arranging.  Her style of arranging is influenced by both styles of arranging.