Kim Foren is trained as a fine art painter, and after 16 years of showing her whimsical oil paintings, she developed a love of flowers and started selling them out of her VW van. She named her business Geranium Lake Flowers, which was inspired by her favorite Windsor and Newton oil paint color Geranium Lake, a saturated fuchsia pink. Now, after 18 years in business, she has become one of the premier event and floral designers in the Portland area and is renowned for her efforts at recycling and sustainability. Kim makes every effort to support local growers by purchasing locally-grown, organic flowers, and she even grows many of her flowers – such as unusual peonies, lilly of the valley, lilac and chocolate cosmos – on her own urban farm. Her shop uses a biodiesel van for deliveries and recycles leftover wedding and event flowers for donation to hospitals and nursing homes. Kim’s creative approach to her business has led The Oregonian to call her “Martha Stewart with an edge,” and Jonathan Nichols and Willamette Weekly claim she “puts a fresh face on floral.”