I love spirea bushes. Those little clusters of flowers are great for macro images and low DOF fun! I took the full color image, added a black and white gradient and then lowered the opacity of the gradient layer to roughly 65%...letting in just a touch of the yellow and green. I also cloned a few small pieces of extraneous flowers from the edges.
Hey Jules,
Do like just the hint of color....seems to work very well. I think the reason the shallow DOF works here is that you chose to focus the front grouping.....and that was the right idea IMO. Seriously debating the twig/branch part in the FG.....as I don't think it adds. Nicely done overall!