Movie work sows seed for import business

On an almost-spring morning, when the Waikato is liberally dotted with trees bearing pink blossoms, Josh Patterson is in his Matangi garage telling the story of how his niche business is built on the back of gorgeous imposters, the artificial cherry blossoms he needed for the sets of Hollywood star Tom Cruise's movie The Last Samurai.

Another of his stories today concerns a party in Auckland in late March to celebrate the coveted Oscar and Bafta awards he had a hand in winning for the blockbuster movie Avatar. It all seems a little unlikely to be talking about this in a Matangi garage.

But Patterson's career has taken a few interesting twists, from farming and arborist work in an earlier life to being the master of illusion for a string of Hollywood movies.

Patterson, 39, was "greens master" in 2002 for the Samurai project, filmed in Taranaki. He and his team took care of all the landscaping, plants, crops and trees (anything "green") used for the movie, including the laborious task of attaching 30,000 artificial blossoms on cherry trees.

To find such plentiful pickings, Patterson went directly to Chinese manufacturers, and discovered the handmade blossoms he needed. He also found valuable contacts, and the seed of an idea to set up in business as a supplier of "silks" – as they're known in the trade – importing high-end artificial flowers and selling them to florists, specialty stores, garden centres, hire companies and the like.

"We've created this entire thing out of it (The Last Samurai)," he says, gesturing around the cavernous garage packed to the rafters with boxes of blooms and foliage. Some boxes are laid open, revealing lush, colourful peonies, gladioli, gerberas, roses, lavender, lilies, poppies and hydrangeas. Some flowers are already bundled in designer arrangements, others are single stems. Flowers everywhere, made from silk, nylon, taffeta and polycottons. Not a fresh bunch in sight, not a hint of the stiff plastic fakes you might find decorating cemeteries or Aunty Flo's home.

Patterson says the handmade blooms are among the last of China's low-tech industries. The flowers are cut from specially dyed fabric and often handpainted for extra effect, sometimes even with deliberately placed blemishes to look like the real thing. "It's a discipline."

Patterson runs his Green Sets business with wife Marie, and the pair are about ready to take on staff and move to a warehouse in Hamilton.They have imported about 200 cubic metres of stock this year, and the business is "growing nicely". No pun intended.

Marie says she knew nothing about flowers when they started, and jokes that Google's been a great research tool. "I knew about orchids, then someone asked me if they were Cymbidium or Phalaenopsis," she says, clearly a bridge too far.

"My nana would know more about flowers than me," Patterson adds.

He's being modest here, because he's spent more than 10 years in the film industry, adding to his knowledge, skills and contacts in the world of design and illusion, transferring what he's learned to his own business.

As well as The Last Samurai, Patterson's run the "greens department" of movies such as The Lord of the Rings, The Legend of Zorro, and James Cameron's recent three-dimensional science fiction Avatar, which bagged three Oscars this year.

Patterson worked on Avatar in Wellington for 14 months, in charge of building the plant life on the planet Pandora. His talents were recognised along with others who'd helped win art director Kim Sinclair the Best Art Direction Oscar for creating the physical world of the film. Avatar also scored a Bafta for this, and Patterson finally got his hands on the hardware at Sinclair's celebration in Auckland.

Patterson says movies pay a lot of money, but they want the results. "With Avatar, I was managing a $5 million budget and had more than 60 people working for me. It was high stakes. It sounds glamorous, but you can't sustain it."

He adds it's difficult to plan your life around movies because it can be a long time between projects, "a long time between drinks".

Patterson hasn't done a film since Avatar (finished in 2007) and has turned down a job on Peter Jackson's upcoming movie, The Hobbit. "The Hobbit will buy (silks) from me, but they don't have to have me."

Patterson wouldn't rule out another movie, though, and there has been talk of Avatar II. The giant plants he constructed for Pandora are in storage in Wellington, and could do with another outing. But he's content with his lot. As he unpacks boxes of silky colour in rural Matangi, he says happily: "I don't have to leave home for this."

- © Fairfax NZ News