Use two types of flowers for this - one spiky and the other with a different shape / texture. I used daffodils and tulips - I couldn’t find any spiky flowers I liked.

Equipment: a long narrow vase or container, oasis.

Flowers and Foliage: 10 x daffodils, 10 x tulips, Choisya Sundance leaves., twigs.

Step 1: soak the oasis and add it to the vase.

Step 2: Use the twigs to build the framework / profile of the arrangement. These define the height and width of it.

Step 3: Add the tall spiky flowers in two groupings, varying the height of the flowers.

Step 4: Add tulips to the base, varying the height of the flowers.

Step 5: Add the foliage to cover the base. Use a colour that complements the arrangement eg. white and silver, yellow in my case.

Step 6: Decorate with lotus seed heads, or berries.

The impact of this is in the height and the use of colour. And I learned a few important things with this one:

• I made the rookie mistake of mixing daffodils with other flowers - a big no-no. Apparently the sap from the daffodils poisons the water for other plants so they sould never be mixed. And as predicted, my tulips drooped within a couple of days. Removing the daffodils fixed that.

• Tulip cut flowers will grow by about another inch in water - who knew? You should factor this growth in when deciding on flower heights in your arrangement.

• Mexican Orange Blossom (Choisya) makes lovely foliage. I must use it more often in my arrangements.

The apricot berries were a last minute addition, compliments of one of my class mates. The colour works well with the tulips.