It started with a wedding
And it was Lacy’s idea.
When she was planning hers, she ran into the question every couple runs into sooner or later: what about the flowers? She wanted something beautiful, something a bit unusual, something that would still be here in twenty years, and something that actually said something about her and her fiancé. Fresh flowers were none of those things.
Her answer was books.
Cherish was in the used book trade at the time, which meant a ready supply of practice material — out-of-date textbooks, long retired from any classroom, that nobody was ever going to teach from again. Good material for a first attempt, and forgiving of the second, third and fortieth. It took a great deal of mangled paper to work out how a petal has to be cut and curled before it looks like it grew that way.
By the time Lacy walked down the aisle, we had it. Her flowers were cut from several of her favorite titles, not just one — and we liked them enough that we never quite stopped making them.
Who we are
Literary Blooms is a mother and daughter team — Cherish Blake and Lacy Blake-Vetter, readers long before we were anything else.
Cherish has since left the book trade altogether. The flowers turned into a full-time job, which is not a complaint. Every one that leaves here is cut, curled and built by one of us, by hand, in the USA.
Our flowers
Every bloom is handmade. Each petal is cut, curled and attached to the stem one at a time, which is slow and is the whole point — it is the only way to choose what shows: the title, the author’s name, the best of the illustrations.
No machines, no dies, no press. Scissors, and a good deal of patience.
Because every petal is placed by hand, no two are ever the same. As in nature. Unlike nature, ours last.
Our books
The books we work from are near the end of their reading lives — well read, soft spines, worn covers, pages working loose. The signs of a book that has been enjoyed thoroughly rather than one that was neglected.
Millions of books are pulped every year. As readers, we could never quite stomach that, so we started taking in the ones that had reached the end. A story doesn’t finish because the binding gave out. It just needs a different shape.
Weddings
We started with one, and they’re still our favorite thing to make. Flowers that are still on the shelf for your tenth anniversary, cut from a book that means something to the two of you.
A book of your own
Looking for a title we don’t carry? Ask. Custom orders are welcome on orders over $50 — a wedding, a gift for someone impossible to buy for, or something far larger than anything on this site. The unusual ones are the ones we enjoy most.
Email inquiries@literaryblooms.com or call 503-888-2719 — and it’s one of us answering, not a help desk.