COMING UP ROSES

Whitney Hawkings, florist to the stars, opens the doors to her stunning six-storey home on the River Thames

-  TRACY SCHAVERIEN

When the style set’s go-to florist Whitney Hawkings and her husband, fashion designer Peter, were ambitious young twenty-somethings, they used to stroll through London’s Chelsea and look wistfully at a beautiful Georgian townhouse, daydreaming that they would one day live in one just like it.

More than 20 years later, the couple have fulfilled that dream. But rather than finding a home similar to the one they had liked so much, overlooking the River Thames and Battersea Bridge, they are now the proud owners of the very same six-storey property they once admired.

“We walked past it so many times when we were young and just married, saying: ‘Oh my god. What would it be like to live in that house?’” Whitney tells HELLO! in this exclusive interview.

“When Peter and I sat down a couple of years ago to figure out what our dream house would look like, he said: 'Do you remember that house we saw years and years ago?' And then I found that it was for sale. Now, I wake up every morning and think: 'How did I get here?' I can't believe how lucky we are.”

There's a lot more than luck behind the couple's story, however. Ten years ago, Whitney launched her luxury flower brand, Flowerbx, which has now blossomed into a multi-million-pound global business supplying top-quality blooms to A-list celebrities, five-star hotels, restaurants and fashion brands around the world.

Customers include David and Victoria Beckham, Julianne Moore, Louis Vuitton, Dior, Jimmy Choo, The River Cafe and Gordon Ramsay's restaurants in London, as well as New York's The Mark, Ritz-Carlton and Park Hyatt hotels.