The dahlia mania is still going strong here at The Posey Box, and we brought in a real, live dahlia expert to help you make your paper flowers even more lifelike! Last week, we invited Jesalyn Pettigrew to chat with our members about this colorful, amazing flower, and we loved every minute of it.

First of all, a little about Jesalyn. She is a single mom to two young boys, and in 2015 she founded Mossy Gate Flower Farm. She started her garden on just 50 square feet, using it to help with a difficult life transition—I know many of you paper florists came to our craft for similar reasons and understand well the joy that creating can bring. 

Jesalyn’s hobby soon grew into a passion, and even though gardening and farming weren’t in her wheelhouse, she learned the ins and outs of the wholesale cut flower farm industry. She now farms over two acres and is the first flower farm for the Puget Sound Food Hub Coop, is a founding member of Genuine Skagit Valley, and was...

Dahlias are one of the most interesting flowers to make from paper. They come in so many drastically different varieties, ranging from very tiny delicate balls to bold flowers the size of dinner plates. Some look like colorful fireworks, others like sea creatures and still others like a honeycomb. One of the reasons for all this diversity of form is actually in the dahlia’s genes. Most plants have two sets of chromosomes. Dahlias have eight. This allows for more genetic combinations and variations, which is why cultivars of the same flower can vary so dramatically.

That jewel-like color and luster of dahlia petals also have a scientific explanation.

The visual intensity is partly to compensate for the fact that dahlias don’t attract pollinators using scent but only color. While a rose might lure a bee by using a sweet perfume, a grassy-smelling dahlia must rely on its good looks.

To tackle this amazing paper flower tutorial, I left the blooms to Quynh. She has...