13. French Mantel Clock
Ai Fiori
Annie Kelly
2025 installation - French Drawing Room
The Inspiration
This eighteenth-century Louis XV-style gilt bronze mantel clock displays a pastoral theme, with porcelain figures of two lovers below, a maiden above the clock face, vines and flowers sounding the clock, and two matching candelabra.
The Flowers
Florist’s inspiration: In order to capture the essence of the Louis XV mantel clock designed by Julien Le Roy, spring flowers and foliage were sustainably arranged to evoke an asymmetrical pastoral theme. Typical to the Rococo style, pastel floral colors and vines, elements of nature, and decorative flowing curves were utilized in the arrangement. Much like the elegant French clockworks of the early to mid 1700's, this floral interpretation duly represents lightness and airiness as well as one's own mortality within the passage of time.
Recipe: A mixture of American and local spring flowers: dogwood, spring branches, strawflower, lisianthus, vines, tulips, orchids, ranunculus, delphinium, anemone
THE DESIGNER
Annie Kelly
Ai Fiori
Founded in late 2021, Ai Fiori LLC is a woman-owned boutique floral design firm specializing in luxurious eye-catching arrangements. Italian for “to the flowers,” the concept “Ai Fiori” blossomed while owner, Annie Kelly, was sitting in the garden of her Capri hotel many years ago. Sipping wine with friends and surrounded by a plethora of wisteria, roses, and endless beauty, Annie thought one should always go to nature and be surrounded by flowers in order to find a sense of joy and an inner peace. Annie believed the best way to share this feeling was by creating floral arrangements for others. Each Ai Fiori arrangement is designed in order to spark an emotional connection with its recipient. Seasonal blooms and foliage are first sourced from local farms and nature before they are thoughtfully and sustainably assembled.
PHOTOGRAPHED BY
Aimee Custis Photography
Aimee Custis & Katie Lingan
Aimee Custis Photography documents weddings, portraits, and events in a rich, luminous, and emotive style. Their inclusive, client-centric approach to wedding photography is informed heavily by Aimee’s background in hospitality, non-profit event planning, and college summers as a camp counselor. Their wedding work has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Washingtonian Weddings.
Aimee (she/they) lives in a rowhouse in Washington DC’s U Street corridor with her husband Greg and golden retriever Whiskey. Aimee is also the web designer behind the Art in Bloom website.
Aimee’s Associate Photographer Katie Lingan is rare cancer survivor with an entrepreneurial spirit. Katie joined the wedding industry in 2012 and has documented hundreds of weddings. Katie believes life is too short not to celebrate happiness.
