Equipment: A heart shaped flat container (we used concrete), three candles, block of oasis.

Flowers and Foliage: Mini Eden roses (4), scabiosa seeds and stalks (4), Nigella (love in the mist) (3), hypericum berries (1), white eryngium (1), mauve eupatorium (3). Note the numbers show #stems, not flowers.

Step 1: Split/slice the oasis into two layers of equal height. Press each side down on one half of the heart container (making sure they meet in the middle) to define the heart shape that needs to be cut out. Cut out each half and fit in into the container. It should be a tight fit. Then level it it at the top if necessary to make a flat surface. Once it all fits together then wet the oasis - I did it in the container.

Step 2: Candles: place the three candles in a group into one side of the heart. They should ideally be inserted at three different heights. Leave space to the side of it for flowers.

Step 3: Roses: cut the flowers to a short stem (about 1 inch) and add to the oasis in small groups of 2 or 3. The objective it to create tightly packed clumps of colour and texture. The flower heads should all sit flush on the oasis. And use the buds as well.

Step 4: Nigella (love in the mist): we used the just-forming seed heads. Trim the stalks to about 1 inch and add them to the oasis in small clumps. Keeping the feathery foliage bits on the seeds adds to the texture.

Step 5: Scabiosa seed heads: add these in groups of two to each side of the heart.

Step 6: Eupatorium: trim the flower heads to 1 inch stems and add the loely mauve flowers in clumps randomly around the oasis. These are the ‘filler’ flowers.

Step 7: Hypericum berries: cut these as individual berries and add them to the arrangement in clumps of 3. Choose areas where the colour contrast is greatest eg. against mauve foliage, or pink flowers.

Step 8: Eryngium: add the small flower heads individually to create a texture contrast. They go well with the nigella seeds or tucked into the eupatorium. These stems are quite soft so you need to feed them into the oasis rather than push them.

Step 9: Scabiosa stems: cut these into smaller pieces and add them to the arrangement in 3-4 small bundles with stems tightly packed together. They look a little like miniature bamboo sticks.

The overall effect is a lovely patchwork of colour and texture. All the flower sit flush against the oasis giving that low multi-texture appearance. Make sure you fill the sides to hide the oasis, bit also retain the shape of the container. The contrast between concrete and the soft textures works really well.