FOR THE LOVE OF…

A Most Incredible Studio × Planks & Pistils Collection

IDENTITY

THE ORIGIN STORY

Before love became a greeting card, it was a movie scene. It was Darius reading poetry to Nina across a smoky Chicago club in Love Jones. It was the boys coming back together over loyalty and laughter in The Wood. It was Dorothy dancing her way home through a Technicolor Oz in The Wiz. These weren’t just films; they were cultural blueprints for how Black people recognized and named the different kinds of love in their lives: the romantic, the ride-or-die, and the pure, unfiltered joy of being alive.

For the Love of… asked a simple question: what if you could build those feelings? Most Incredible Studio partnered with Planks & Pistils, a Chicago-based floral studio founded by John Caleb Pendleton that uses flowers and woodworking to tell Black stories and inspire human flourishing. Pendleton, a self-taught floral artist originally from Grove Hill, Alabama, named his studio after his parents: “Planks” for his father, a woodworker, and “Pistils” for his mother, who always kept flowers in the house. His work has been featured everywhere from Nike collaborations to Mayor Brandon Johnson’s inauguration, and he’s built a practice around using live flowers as a medium for community art that honors Black history. He was the perfect partner to bridge the language of florals with the language of bricks.

Together, MIS and Planks & Pistils went scene by scene through each film and pulled the actual flowers from their worlds, not generic roses, but the specific blooms that belonged to each story’s geography and meaning. For Love Jones, that meant purple alstroemeria, yellow freesia, and pink statice from the sidewalk café scene where Nina talks with her girl, plus white mums, the city flower of Chicago, because the film’s setting is as much a character as Darius and Nina. For The Wood, it was bird of paradise (the flower of Los Angeles), American yellow rocket (which grows wild in California), and flowering dogwood (the state flower of North Carolina, a nod to the Southern roots woven through Inglewood), all bursting from a slice of pizza a tribute to the spinning pizza scene that anyone who’s seen the movie can picture instantly. For The Wiz, the composition followed Dorothy’s journey: poppies at the front of the path (the “evil” influence that pulled them off course), clear pieces representing the kaleidoscope of colors from the “The Color Is” segment, and then a burst of red roses at the end the state flower of New York because Dorothy just wanted to be back home.

Dropped on Valentine’s Day 2024, the collection was an invitation to build something meaningful with someone you love, not just a romantic partner, but a best friend, a sister, a chosen family member, through a memory that already mattered to them. Every flower was chosen because it belonged to the story. Every story was chosen because it belonged to the culture.

THE BUILD

Above - For the Love of Partnership  —  Inspired by Love Jones (1997)

Above - For the Love of Joy  —  Inspired by The Wiz (1978)

For the Love of Friendship  —  Inspired by The Wood (1999)

CULTURAL CONTEXT

Planks & Pistils — Chicago-based floral studio founded by John Caleb Pendleton, rooted in Black joy, using art to highlight Black stories and inspire human flourishing. planksandpistils.com

Love Jones (1997) — Written and directed by Theodore Witcher. Starring Larenz Tate and Nia Long. Set among Chicago’s Black creative community, widely regarded as one of the defining Black love stories in American cinema.

The Wood (1999) — Written and directed by Rick Famuyiwa. A coming-of-age story centered on Black male friendship in Inglewood, California.

The Wiz (1978) — Directed by Sidney Lumet. Starring Diana Ross and Michael Jackson. An all-Black reimagining of The Wizard of Oz and a celebration of Black creativity, community, and the joy of self-discovery.

WBEZ Chicago — "Chicago florist John Caleb Pendleton arranges flowers into Black stories"

Because of Them We Can — "Meet the Chicago Florist Using Art Installations to Shine a Light on Blackness"