The Flower Room is the oldest co-operative in Tasmania. It began with the Boomerang Stall, an initiative of the Tasmanian Women’s Home Industries whose members sold ‘home made goods of every description including cakes, flowers, plants and needlework’. They also mended clothes for customers, provided afternoon teas and light luncheons and cared for the children of members when they worked there. The Boomerang Stall was a counter located in the shop of Mr William Whitfield at 87 Elizabeth Street, Hobart, where you could buy ‘the freshest fruit, and the best sweets at the lowest prices’.
Through much of World War II, sisters Hally and Emma Sisters Hally and Emma Bayly at their home, Runnymede Bayly sold flowers, fruit and vegetables at the Boomerang Stall which they grew at their family home, the historic property of Runnymede. With rationing in force during World War II, their produce would have been greatly appreciated by the citizens of Hobart. In late 1942 however, they were informed that the Boomerang Stall would be an outlet for home cooks only and flowers would no longer be sold.
The Misses Bayly, now in their mid 50s, called a meeting of other ‘flower members’. They decided to establish their own shop and rented a room at the rear of 27 Murray Street, Hobart. Each member contributed five pounds for the purchase of shelving, a counter, vases for the flowers and stationery to keep accounts. The committee called the shop The Flower Room and it opened in March 1943. While only flowers were sold initially, members began to supply baked goods, preserves and handcrafts to offset the lack of flowers in winter months. An early document describes The Flower Room as ‘a co-operative of gardeners, floral artists, handcraft workers and cooks who together seek a market for their home industries’. Over eighty years later, The Flower Room remains a successful organisation and its customers continue to enjoy the produce of its members.