French Blooms: Fun Facts Behind the Book

I’d thought it would be fun to share a few facts you might not know about the making of my book French Blooms. Some are funny, some are not what you might have expected, but the story that runs throughout is that I put my heart and soul into creating a book for you about my love of flowers and France. I hope you enjoy the behind-the-scenes extras below…

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• I started working on this book in 2019!

• To get a book picked up by a publisher, you first need to write a book proposal. Because I had no idea what that meant, I found myself googling “how do you write a book proposal?” Well, I must have done something right!

• I traveled to France 13 times in 3 years to complete the book.

• Because I don’t live in France and didn’t have my apartment yet, I stayed in hotels, Airbnbs and friends’ homes while working on the book in France.

• Most of the book was shot in France, primarily Paris, Normandy and Provence, but some shots were recreated in either Kindra’s or my backyard.

• I designed and styled over 50 floral recipes, but only 24 made it into the book.

• Finding the right shot for the cover was the hardest part of this book! If you’ve seen my recent blog French Blooms: The Cover, you know we went through a few versions, and I changed my mind at the last minute. Thankfully, my editors at Rizzoli were kind enough to give me one more week to shoot a new cover!

• I originally organized the book with floral arrangements for every season. Because I often get the question, “these flowers are beautiful but where would I put this in my house?”, I wanted to make sure the arrangements were practical. I ultimately decided to organize it by location in the house to show all the wonderful ways you can decorate your home with florals. However, floral arrangements for every season might be a great idea for a future book!

• I picked the lily of the valley in my own garden for the May Day bouquet in the book.

• In France, lily of the valley blooms in early May, but doesn’t typically appear until mid-May here in New England.

• In France, I found the flowers I used for arrangements at French flower shops, gardens and by foraging, sometimes in areas I probably shouldn’t have, but that’s a story for another day!

• By the end of creating the photography for the book, including a photo shoot at the French wholesale flower market Rungis, I was finally accepted by Rungis as a buyer!

• Below, you can see me shopping for flowers at Rungis. In reality, I was just picking them up for the photos, making sure to quickly put them back in water. Anything for a photo, right?

• I sourced most of the containers from the Parisian flea markets on the day we were shooting, and filled them soon thereafter.

• Most of the antique vessels I used for the book are so special to me that I have them tucked away in a closet in my home. I hope to display them somewhere soon!

• I purchased the antique French doors (shot for the cover) in France, then had them shipped back to the States. I now have them displayed in my home to be reminded daily of that memorable photo shoot which made the book cover.

• The adorable dog on the back cover of my book is not my dog; his name is “Ghetto,” and he belongs my friend Sharon Santoni. I think he did a great job posing!

• One silver lining throughout the pandemic is that it gave me the time to work on this book. Without that, to be honest, I’m not sure it would have been possible with a family and busy shop.

• On a final note, I received the very first copy of the book in January, which was truly a magical moment! It’s been so hard keeping this secret for three years, especially now that I’ve gotten the book in my hand.

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I hope you enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look at how my book came to be. I’m beyond grateful for all of you who preordered the book and I can’t wait to hear what you think of it!

I’m getting excited for the books to ship out in a few short weeks! I hope to see you at the Les Fleurs book signing on April 2nd at noon!

Merci,
Sandra

P.S. - Stay tuned for more book events to be posted on our website and follow along on social media @lesfleursandover for more behind-the-scenes snippets about the book.