Fleurs des Rêves: iridescent flowers by Bompas and Parr

Perrier-Jouët Fleurs des Rêves: colour-changing flowers by Bompas and Parr

Perrier-Jouët Fleurs des Rêves: Bompas and Parr created colour changing flours for an dreamy installation that blends the vernaculars of French decadence, chemistry and an ultra-exotic flower shop.

Perrier-Jouët Fleurs des Rêves – Photo by Ann Charlott Ommedal, courtesy of Bompas and Parr.

On Valentine’s Day, Bompas and Parr and Perrier-Jouët champagne present the world’s first iridescent flowers. The Perrier-Jouët Fleurs des Rêves installation in the basement of London EDITION invites design lovers to compose colour-changing bouquets playing with chemistry and fire.

Photo by Ann Charlott Ommedal.

“Through the Unknown, we’ll find the New” wrote Charles Baudelaire in Les Fleurs du Mal… “This Valentine’s day, see things no-one else can see, do things no-one else can do” say Sam Bompas and Harry Parr.

Photo by Ann Charlott Ommedal.

The designers created an ultra-exotic flower shop drawing inspiration from Perrier-Jouët imprint: fin-de-siècle French Decadence movement. The creative workshops at the Fleurs des Reves installation allow to create two different forms of chameleon blooms.

Photo by Ann Charlott Ommedal.

The first is treated with a liquid crystal dye that changes at 27 degrees Celsius from a deep satin black to Champagne bottle green exhibiting all the hues regularly seen on the backs of beetles. “You can cup the flower in yours and your lover’s hands to effect the transformation or even use your hot breath!” suggest Sam Bompas and Harry Parr.

The second varietal of colour changing flowers are treated with a black thermo-chromatic dye that is transformed at 31 degrees Celsius. The bloom is then spritzed with Bompas & Parr’s perfumed crystal elixir and ignited. In the heat of the flame, the blossom changes colour revealing the original pigment.

“The ritual of giving a bouquet becomes a total sensory onslaught, enhancing the fleeting enchantment of this Valentine’s tradition” comment Bompas and Parr. Perrier-Jouët Fleurs des Rêves hosts also champagne tasting and workshops of bouquets’ composition, floriography and Art of Giving more specific meanings to flowers.

Photo by Ann Charlott Ommedal.

By the same token the set design of the installation builds on the listless, bejeweled interiors of 1890s Parisian Salons with contemporary hypnogogic video art and technical lighting. ““Our blooms go far further, by incorporating techno-chemicals and thermo-chromatic inks. Think Gustave Moreau’s Salomé seen through a pulsating lenticular screen!”