Coventry Edwards-Pitt
Planting Seeds with Finance and Flowers
SEW & BLOOM
Photos by John Bessler
For 25 years, Coventry “Covie” Edwards-Pitt, has navigated the intricate world of wealth advising, guiding families through the complexities of financial planning. As a Partner and the Chief Creative Officer at Ballentine Partners, she authored the Firm’s Healthy, Wealthy & Wise collection. This three-book series is based on a 10-year research effort interviewing, studying, and ultimately highlighting success stories of individuals who have successfully worked to reconcile their financial abundance with their relationships and values.
While working on her second book in the series, Covie reflected on a question that was asked repeatedly in her research: If today was your last day on Earth, what would you regret not having done? This pivotal question led Covie to make time for her art, a passion for flowers and floral design that was literally in her own backyard. As a little girl, she would draw flowers in every imaginable form, dreaming that one day her designs would come to life. Today, Covie curates and maintains an exceptional garden teeming with flora and fauna that she loves to capture through photography and drawing. These images soon lead to a passion for pattern creation based on the blooms and garden outside her window, and an enchanting collection of original botanical textile and wallpaper designs, floral design books, garden essentials, and sumptuous fabrics.
Realizing her collection had well surpassed online print capabilities, and her passion exceeded simply creating prints to share, Covie opened Sew & Bloom in Cambridge, Massachusetts in September of 2023. She now splits her time between her two professional callings— devoting the beginning of each week to helping clients, families, and advisors implement the strategies in her books, and the remainder to running this haven of floral splendor and artistic ingenuity. Sew & Bloom is indeed a tribute to Covie's lifelong love affair with flowers. But Sew & Bloom is much more than just a store— it's a community hub where kindred spirits gather to celebrate their shared love of flowers, patterns, and textiles.
When asked about how she hopes the space serves the community, Covie explained, “The shop grew out of my artistic dream to have a place where my designs and love of all things botanical could exist out in the real world. However, one of the reasons I named the shop Sew & Bloom was to offer a space where others can sow their own creative dreams— to one day have a garden, learn to paint flowers, bring floral beauty into their home, or simply to make more time for color and creativity in their lives.”
When asked about which part of the creative process she enjoys the most, Covie explained, “I truly love everything about the creative process— from designing the garden to photographing the flowers, to creating my surface design patterns, to figuring out which home decor products would be optimal for each pattern… If I had to pick one aspect, though, I'd say creating designs with my floral photography during the winter months in New England.” Covie uses these quieter, winter months to create surface pattern designs with the flower photos captured during the warmer seasons. “It began as a way to give my beautiful blooms another life—on wallpaper, fabric, or stationery— and now has become the way I ‘garden’ during the off-season. It's such a joy to surround myself visually with flowers during these months and to create designs that not only chronicle the garden that existed but also imagine combinations that didn't exist (i.e. combining lavender May lilacs with deep violet October dahlias to create a rich, purple-hued design).
While gardening and florals may not appear to have much overlap with wealth advising, Covie has found a way to combine their teachings as she straddles these two passions.
"One of the things I love about gardening is that it provides a daily reminder (a beautiful and gentle one at that) of some of the existential truths in life— of the reality of our mortality, the constancy of change, the chance for renewal after loss, and the need to appreciate the beauty of each moment because it will never reappear in that exact form again."
“I try in my work with my clients to bring that perspective, to focus on the intersection of heart and wealth and move our conversations beyond the oft-trodden landscape of the wealth advising space (investment returns, optimizing estate taxes, etc.) to the issues that end up really mattering to people at the core (i.e. Will I be happy with how I have used my finite time on this Earth? Will I be satisfied with the impact of my resources on my children? Are there any regrets I have that I can attend to now?) It can sound heavy or daunting, but actually, I find that these are the very issues that most people are hungering to think about and there is a sense of relief that comes with actually engaging intentionally in these deeper discussions.”
In addition to her work and collection at Sew & Bloom, Covie's artistic vision extended to a collaboration with Scarlett Chase, where she customized one of her exquisite floral designs for the brand, integrating the SC monogram onto the vines. This pattern can be found in the Weston Mule and Chase Loafer Collections here.
Need a little (or a lot) of floral inspiration? Visit www.sewandbloom.com, or follow on Instagram at @sewandbloom. Trust us, your days will be brighter for the regular reminders of the beauty all around us.
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