Specialty flower store, the English Garden, 1199 S. Coast Highway, is celebrating their 20th year in business with an open house all day on March 2.
Established on March 1, 1991, by Anita Valdez, whose family is also in the florist business, the shop added staff as business blossomed. Today, the shop offers weekly residential and corporate accounts and extensive decorating services for special occasions. Its two fulltime designers, two shop assistants and delivery staff prepare from 12 to 200 arrangements daily. During the peak season beginning in November, the shop also adds freelance staff, including designers, processors and delivery personnel.
Besides the busiest day of the year, Valentine’s Day, the high school’s winter formal is also in February. “We have a line out the door for our signature boutonnieres and corsages,” she said.
Valdez said her most unusual request was providing flowers for a wedding in Mexico, which required negotiating the agriculture department of another country as well as preserving the specialty order. “It was a race with time, but all turned out well,” she said.
While known for creative arrangements, the shop is also known for over the top Halloween displays. “May favorite story was a local approaching me in a market in Laguna asking if I wanted a coffin….I asked him if it was used,” Valdez recalled. It turned up in the shop “graveyard” the very next Halloween.
For more info: visit englishgardenflorals.com, or call 949-494-7114.
