2022 Speaker Profile: Philippe Gouze
Meet Philippe Gouze, floral designer and Director of Operations of Blue Hill Restaurant at Stone Barns, where we are holding our special Slow Flowers Summit dinner on Monday, June 27th. As part of the Slow Flowers Summit, Philippe and Shannon Algiere will kick off our Day Two program with a presentation called "The Flowers at Stone Barns Center & Blue Hill." On Day Three, he will be part of our Floral Immersion, demonstrating to attendees the design and installation process of Blue Hill's farm table displays. Debra Prinzing recently interviewed Philippe for this Slow Flowers Summit feature.
On Wednesday mornings, before the first day of the week for Blue Hill, Philippe Gouze designs the florals throughout the celebrated Michelin 2-star restaurant. He may bring a bucket of branches pruned from his own garden in nearby Rockland County where he has lived for more than 20 years with his husband and a rotating cast of cats, dogs, and chickens. He most certainly will have gleaned and foraged nature's seasonal blooms along the way, and will incorporate flowers harvested from the greenhouses and flower fields at Stone Barns. Philippe's seasonal displays incorporate cut floral arrangements and plants, including his vast orchid collection. The botanicals appear in the foyer, bar area, and on the large farm table in the center of Blue Hill's dining room. On a recent Wednesday morning he brought branches of weigela, honey locust and ninebark from his garden. "I arrange the flowers the first thing in the morning - before I do anything else."