Who He Is
Lewis Miller grew up on a farm in California's Central Valley. At 18, he moved to Seattle to study horticulture and landscape design. In 2000, he moved to New York City and worked for one of the city's top floral boutiques before opening his own studio, Lewis Miller Design, in 2002. His studio has created floral designs for clients such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum, Tiffany & Co., and Bergdorf Goodman.
Why He Matters
In October 2016, Miller and his team surprised New Yorkers with their first "Flower Flash," covering the "Imagine" mosaic in Central Park's Strawberry Fields with flowers. By 2021, they had created more than 90 of these pop-up installations, filling trash cans, bus shelters, construction sites, and statues with colorful blooms for strangers to discover. His work has been called "the Banksy of floral design." In May 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, his team created a Flower Flash outside NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital to thank healthcare workers. His 2021 book, Flower Flash, takes readers behind the scenes. Miller showed that floral design does not have to live inside a vase or a ballroom. It can be public art that brings joy to a whole city.
