I was born in the University town of Freiburg at the foot of the Black Forest in Germany. When I was little, my mother took me for walks through the blooming summer fields. We sat on the ground and picked flowers, which we bound into big bouquets.

 From my earliest school years my hands couldn’t be still – they were always creating: drawing, painting, sewing, modeling, embroidering, knitting, making flowers from many different kinds of materials.

 After high school I moved to Hamburg to study Fashion Design and then went to Paris where I worked with an art dealer for some years. On our almost daily visits to the main auction house, galleries and museums, I learned a lot about art and the market - and did not like the hype - I wanted something different.

One day the small book My Life with Picasso by Françoise Gillot changed my life and I became a painter. To begin with, it wasn’t at all about being an artist – I just wanted to put colors on a canvas. And then it got more serious: I went to Amsterdam to study fine arts. My style became more precise and elaborate until a few years later I added embroidery to the paintings.

In January 2012 change stroke again, this time in form of the lush and fragrant Foster Botanical Garden in Honolulu. Today I would say - Trust Life! It always brings you where you need to be and to the experiences which you need to have! You will get the signs and one day you will stop ignoring them! For years I had felt jealous of landscape architects and now I felt ready to make a step.

Back in Brussels I gave up my studio, learned garden design and began creating hand-in-hand with nature. Instead of adding more paintings to all the paintings in the world, I chose to add some gardens to the lack of gardens in the world.  

Change stroke again and I now have returned to embroidery. I have stopped painting. I am back to couture. I am making flowers. My hands need to create and I want to see a little bit of nature everywhere when it is grey and rainy outside. 

From biophilia I learned that nature - even ‘artificial nature’ - can have a positive influence on the brain and our well-being. We create more peace within by stimulating our minds with ‘green’. 

Another influence on my art is the Sogetsu school of Ikebana. Living in Belgium I am profoundly grateful to be taught by the internationally acclaimed Ikebana artist and teacher Ilse Beunen. Apart from beautiful flower compositions, I am slowly learning to train my mind, my eye and my heart - and my hands as well.

One of my ideas about gardens has been creating gardens for peace. And while this is a complex on a bigger scale, a piece of an artistic couture garden is very possible even in a small space.   

My creations can be as small as a single flower, or as large as small indoor garden. They can be for the floor, the tabletop or the wall.

If you would like me to enliven your space with a textile flower sculpture, you can contact me at annettemann.art@gmail.com