Whether gracing a table for a party or simply adding a bit of color to your bedside table, these floral inspirations will breathe new life into any room.

Beat the summer heat with a container water garden that doubles as a beautiful decoration. These water plants get their nutrients from water and require no soil to thrive.

Massed at eye level in a rustic trough, pink cherry blossoms join white dogwood and spirea to give armchair nature lovers a breath of fresh air. The branches stand in chicken wire that has been bent to fit the container's liner. Moss and lichen from a florist mask the wire support in sylvan style.

This flower's stem has the graceful posture of a ballerina. Instead of hiding such elegant stalks inside tall vases, show them off in a variety of bowls.

Two stars of the garden -- Asiatic lilies and lacy alchemilla -- team up in this stellar arrangement.

Mingle dainty Spanish bluebells with fluffy chive blossoms for textured arrangements.

By late summer, these hardy shrubs are bursting in riotous colors and textures. In this arrangement, soft lavender mopheads pop out.

With petite flowers dangling from high-reaching stems, Nectaroscordum siculum stretches out like a long afternoon. Gather stems of different lengths in a tall vessel; they'll stand as loftily as they do in the garden.

Rose hips mixed with eucalyptus fruit and leaves in pewter vessels put on an ebullient show.

Take a cue from classic Dutch painters and create a floral display that's as captivating as an early-17th-century still life by Jacques de Gheyn or Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder.

Like a tapestry, this bouquet is a celebration of rich hues and textures. Round 'Autumn Joy' and fuzzy fuchsia Celosia provide fullness, while snowberries and blue 'Indigo Spires' function as accents.

In the garden, globe-shaped blooms float high above other plants, flaunting their colorful starbursts. And in cut arrangements, the ornamental onions can be just as delightfully impudent.

Here, brilliant violet Muscari latifolium and tight blooms of Ranunculus get a boost in a lush, dense display.

Let your china inspire you. Here, 'White Parrot' tulips and 'Saphir' muscari echo the hues of a willowware bowl.

Designed to replicate exotic blooming trees, this poetic display is an illusion contrived by securing blossoms to buckthorn branches. Bursts of color electrify the wood and its surrounding space, making an ideal -- if ephemeral -- setting for entertaining.

A faux-bois container is filled with dozens of golden Ice Follies and Erlicheer, a fragrant double daffodil.

This bouquet of late-blooming annuals -- cut from the garden and tucked into an ironstone vessel alongside a compote of blueberries -- is at once lively and serene.

Don't look to the garden just for flowers. The ornamental containers used there can often beautify homes and arrangements as well.

This cast-iron urn with a weatherworn painted finish has just the right scale, palette, and presence for a riot of velvet-red kangaroo paws.

Quail, Professor Einstein, and Delibes mix with tulips, viburnum, lily of the valley, and lady's mantle. Before putting daffodils with other flowers, change the water frequently until their toxic sap dissipates.

Enliven your next buffet with an arrangement of eggcup bouquets displayed on cake stands. Choose small-budded flowers in similar hues, such as the tulips, lily of the valley, paperwhites, and daffodils we used. Trim the stems so the blossoms will peek over the rims of the eggcups. Place a small round metal floral frog in each eggcup to help shape and weight the arrangements. Fill the cups three-quarters of the way with water, and then add the blooms. Arrange the mini bouquets on and around stands. Water daily for a long-lasting centerpiece.

Two of New York City's most acclaimed floral designers share their step-by-step for this beguiling bouquet of dogwood, mountain laurel, and garden roses.

A mixed bouquet is artfully rearranged among a dozen slender vases, freeing each bloom to flaunt its beauty. Much is made of long stems, but trimming them to staggered heights lets individual roses stand out.

Make waves with an arrangement set in a seashell. The trick is to fit a piece of floral foam inside the shell.

Capable of much more than just filling space, baby's breath is actually most impressive on its own. Buy a mass of it or set aside some from other bouquets, and then group it into a soft and blurry cloud, grounding the stems in cleverly concealed blocks of floral foam.

Renowned floral designers Remco Van Vliet and half-brother Cas Trap create an artful arrangement that seems suspended in a round, clear bowl.

Inspired by the jeweled treasures crafted by Peter Carl Faberge around the turn of the 20th century, this "egg" is decorated with spring-blooming hyacinths and pearl-headed pins.

Ornamental cabbages and kales, better known as colorful pinch hitters in cool-season gardens, lend an unexpected grace to indoor displays. Here, peony-like clusters and lacy, pink-tinged leaves are interspersed with seeded eucalyptus and arranged in a weathered urn.

Stems of delphinium and larkspur in graduated blue-violet tones form an arrangement that's at once subtle and opulent. The shift in shades concludes with the vase, a dark-blue ceramic bowl that complements the larkspur, lowest in the display.

Inexpensive and readily available, spider mums can be tinted to look like fireworks. Group blooms of different colors in assorted vessels for a dazzling display.

Lilac's subtle color variations are perfect for creating this painterly, layered arrangement.

Ubiquitous, inexpensive, and long lasting, carnations possess gorgeous petals -- and distracting sepals attached to the stems. Clustering the blooms, whether monochromatic or multihued, into a dense dome plays up the flowers' prettiest feature.