A field of Wildflowers with Zane

Zane is back at Storm with another exciting workshop for our community’s youth and families! This time, we’ll be working with wildflowers from near and far—from Palestine to New York. We’ll learn what makes a flower wild, native or non-native, then create our own field of blooms using real pressed flowers our friends brought back from around the world (Palestine, Lebanon, Mexico, Nicaragua, NY…). We’ll also make flower crowns, plant flowers to take home, and enjoy tea and treats made with edible flowers.

The workshop is recommended for ages 4-12.

One ticket per child, with discounts available for siblings.

Free for Palestinian families — just email programs@stormbookstore to reserve your spots!

ON THE AGENDA
Table Exploration
Families will arrive to a table filled with fresh and dried flowers from around the world. They’ll be invited to explore the plants up close—touching, smelling, and observing the different shapes and textures.

Discussion
We’ll learn what makes a flower wild, native, or non-native (sometimes called invasive), and how we can take care of the plants around us. We’ll also explore how flowers are used in everyday life, stories, and traditions across SWANA (South West Asia and North Africa).

Flower crown activity
Fareed the Fox needs our help making flower crowns—for you and for his friend Omar the Octopus!

Field of wildflowers collage
Together we will work to create our own field of wildflowers by taping flowers and drawing plants on a big piece of rolled out paper.

Plant wildflower seeds
Pot a variety of plants to take home

Edible flowers, cupcakes, and sweet goodbyes!
We’ll decorate cupcakes with edible blooms, enjoy a treat, then say our goodbyes.

Zane Elias is a Palestinian-American environmental educator and gardener. He completed a fellowship at the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens Children’s Garden and currently works alongside the waterfront alliance as their environmental educator.

This project is a part of the What Can We Do? Artist Grant program, presented by Asian American Arts Alliance (A4) and is supported by the Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice.