THE AUTHORS
~What Cut Flower is That?~
More about the authors…
The lead authors of the manual are Delwyn (Del) Thomas and Bettina Gollnow.
Delwyn Thomas is a horticulturist, floral designer and floriculturist. She has spent many years working across all facets of the nursery and garden industry.
Del ran a successful foliage farm and spent 15 years as the floral consultant on a leading bridal magazine. She project managed the national Grow Me Instead program to identify and bring awareness to garden escapes that have become environmental weeds. She is well known for her depth of plant knowledge. Writing this book was the realisation of a vision she held during her 22 years of teaching at TAFE.
Del has dedicated many years to growing, identifying and arranging cut flowers and foliages, and this book distils that knowledge.
She gathered information for this book from growers, plant breeders, floral designers, postharvest experts, wholesalers, and fellow teachers to ensure that it provides the most up-to-date information on all products. She continues to contribute to various industry publications; willingly shares her knowledge and believes we are privileged to work with the world’s most beautiful floral products.
The easy, readable style and appealing design reflects the expertise and attention to detail of the technical editor Matthew Stevens to whom the authors are most grateful.
Bettina Gollnow is currently the Communications & Extension Manager for WildFlowers Australia, the national industry association focusing on the marketing and sales of cut flower and foliage products of Australian and closely related South African species for the floristry industry. Prior to that she provided extension support to the commercial NSW cut flower industry as the Industry Development Officer (Floriculture) for the NSW Department of Primary Industries for over 18 years.
During that time, Bettina brought industry members together through publications, industry events and technical resources. She also completed two projects for RIRDC, firstly developing the 2005–2011 Wildflower and Native Plants Industry R&D plan and reviewing the achievements of the previous plan. Subsequently she led the project to develop the quality specifications for Australian wildflowers and the supporting post-harvest manual.
