Meet the founder: Huiyin from Echevaria.co

We were lucky to sit down with Huiyin from Echevaria.co, a sustainable botanical design company. Below she shares some of her best tips and tricks of incorporating flowers and wreaths into your household, as well as a bit about her journey and the importance of sustainability. Echevaria.co's beautiful wreaths will be on display at our free annual Holiday Photoshoot, so make sure you sign up here

1. Tell us a bit about yourself.

Hey! I’m Huiyin, the Founder of Echevaria.co, a botanical design studio based in Singapore! Echevaria.co has a focus on Sustainable Floristry, which means we use sustainable mechanics in the building of our designs and embrace regionally-sourced tropical flora and fauna when possible, to reduce our carbon footprint.

2. How did you get into the floristry business & what does it mean to you?

The inception of Echevaria.co came about 3 years ago, when I received my first bouquet of fresh cut flowers. I absolutely loved the bouquet when I received it, however less than 2 weeks later, I was devastated to find all the flowers starting to wither and brown. That sparked my journey to finding an alternative to fresh flower bouquets and come up with a sustainable option. With Echevaria.co, we make use of repottable foliage in our bouquets, which means that some of the foliage that you find will still have their roots attached to them. This allows the receipent to repot the leaves into a pot of soil when the rest of the fresh materials wither away. The repotted plant will now continue growing and thriving in your care forever!

3. What are your top tips for using floristry in your home & how can one implement them?

I believe having nature in your home is so important, it creates a sense of balance and brings warmth into our concrete environment. On days of special occasions or celebrations, I’d recommend making an arrangement of fresh cut Orchids or Lilies to bring a breath of fresh air into your space. Flowers like Orchids, Liles, Anthuriums, Chrysanthemums are easily sourced from neighbouring countries, making it a more sustainable option compared to using Roses or Hydrangeas from Kenya and Netherlands respectively. Echevaria.co also creates repottable bouquets/ table centerpieces which features using regionally-sourced flowers and repottable foliage, feel free to check it out. For usual days, I’d would recommend leaning towards using houseplants or potted flowers like a Phalaenopsis Orchid. Potted plants offer the same value of adding a slice of nature in your home and does not require weekly replacement. 

4. What role does sustainability play for Echevaria.co?

For us, sustainability is our guide in choosing our botanical palettes for all our designs. We believe that we have to maximise our resources, minimise our waste and most importantly, learn to embrace what we have around us. With every event that we do, our team curates the botanical palette and mechanic suitable for the design. Our guiding factors are sustainability-based:

1. Using repottable material

2. Embracing Regional Flora and Fauna

3. Using Sustainable Floral Mechanics Read more about our Sustainability Efforts here.

You can find out more about all of Echevaria.co's services and offers on their website here