Jess Bernauer opened her shop aged 20. Ten years on, she’s still the proud owner of Wild Lotus Floral Design, a small but thriving florist that caters to a dedicated clientele stretching from Palm Beach to the Hunter Valley.
Nestled in the sleepy beachside suburb of Newport, Wild Lotus is run by father-daughter duo Jess and Kel Bernauer, who have a reputation as one of the most personable teams on the Northern Beaches. In an area where community is everything, the pair have built a loyal customer following, and many fill their homes with Wild Lotus flowers year round.
This tight relationship with the locals does more than simply lift a living room with pretty petals, the Bernauers are also saving marriages. “You might get a husband come in buying something for his wife and he has no idea,” says papa Bernauer. “They’ll say ‘I want a bunch of natives’ and you know that that’s not what she wants.”
“Our style is lush and full,” explains Jess Bernauer. “We like to use lots of different tropical foliage and interesting textures. In the city you see a lot of bouquets that don’t have much foliage, they’re quite minimalist.”
The front window at Wild Lotus is a great representation of the store itself: a big, unique spirit that dominates a rather small space. Right now the display is full of silk cotton-tree branches and native wattles with hidden gems like their winter peach blossoms on show at the back – one of the owner’s favourites.
What sets the store apart is a culture of familiarity. Wild Lotus is truly a family business, often counting on help from the rest of the Bernauer clan, and reliant solely on Kel Bernauer to deliver all over the city. “I’m very lucky, everyone’s always happy to see me, and it’s pretty special to be able to share all these amazing things of nature with people. It’s a pretty lucky job,” he says.