Equipment: Tall container - I used a terracotta pot from the garden, oasis.

Flowers and Foliage: A wide selection this week - all taken from the garden. I just collected anything that looked useful.

Flowers: hydrangeas, sedum , leucadendron, dipeltha flowers and leaves.

Foliage: cordyline, berberis (the purple), phormium, leucadendron, citrus leaves, strawberry tree leaves, fatsia.

Seed Heads: agapanthus, poppy, stinking iris (iris foetidissima) seeds, strawberry tree berries.

Step 1: Stand the wet oasis upright in the pot. Secure with tape if needed.

Step 2: Add the tall foliage first. Use the longer branches to define the framework of the arrangement: height, width and depth. I used the cordyline, berberis, phormium and dipeltha for this.

Step 3: Fill in the gaps with with smaller, tiered foliage. I used lemon leaves, dipeltha, leucadendron, strawberry tree, fatsia.

Step 4: start adding the larger flowers to define the main areas of colour. These were the hydrangea and sedum flowers. Add them in a random way - it looks more authentic than a symmetrical arrangement.

Step 5: add the smaller statement flowers to the arrangement. Think of where you want to draw the eye to the arrangement. I used the dipeltha and leucadendron flowers for this.

Step 6: Add the seed heads to add texture and colour. The agapanthus first, then the stinking iris seed heads. Lastly add any berries or fruit you may have.

This is about autumn extravagance. The objective is to go wide and high, as much as the container will allow it. Some of the arrangements used large autumn leaves as the main framework, others used decorative branches. There was a wide selection of autumn flowers: hydrangeas, dahlias, sedum, roses. Most of the flowers and foliage came from peoples’ gardens.

Another interesting part of flower school classes is finding interesting containers to use. This one was a case in point: it needed to be tall, an urn shape and heavy enough to support such a tall, wide arrangements. There were a lot of different things used: a small milk churn, wine buckers, jugs, boxes, terracotta pots and some tall, heavy coloured glass and ceramic vases. I love searching out interesting things to use, and comparing interesting containers with everybody else. Reflective surfaces work really well with flower arrangements.

The arrangements this week were amazing. One of our best weeks at flower school.