Artisan florist and British flower grower creating sustainable eco friendly seasonal floral designs
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On doing one thing at a time……
…….. flowering current currently flowering made into a wreath with nothing but a reusable frame and branches ….
….. oh and a bit of string. It’s a flower day today so sowing more flowers and feeding the roses and just focusing on doing one thing with my string …..
Beauty, beginnings and being bold…….
….. from our wild garden to your wild hearts, as our blue seedlings 🌱 are stoped temporarily under a frosted starry sky, I am reminded ‘tis the season of rest and patience but particularly for us this year, our seasonal endeavours are:
…… the joy and beauty of learning to love life fiercely and that includes the love for our wild garden and her trees and her hedgerows and currently the wood mice eating the wires on the car 😂……
…… soon we will celebrate Welsh Valentines St Dwynwen’s Day - the Welsh 🏴 patron saint of lover’s and fall in love all over again with nature’s beauty and her craft
…… so from our canalside cutting garden and the Wharf where we gather and make our wild garden style floral arrangements, we’ll be making wild garden style wreaths all over again……
…… in the photo is an example of one of my everlasting flower wreath made of flowers grown here. If you wish to support our local environmentally driven business and send some love, we’ll be delighted to deliver flowers from our garden to send everlasting love - contact [email protected]
On peace ……
……. there’s no other time that quite marks the passing of the year …..
…..diolch un fawr - thank you 🙏 for supporting our endeavours to create a florally sustainable business with our Cheshire grown flowers - from our grateful hearts 🥰
…… and may the slow silence of the New Year’s winter day greet you with peaceful beauty…..
….. a flower wreath of white dahlias - including Petra’s wedding , small world and peacock gladioli - on the door of the Wharf where the tubers are currently hibernating …..
On new beginnings……
…… sometimes the greatest challenge is to actually begin;
…… so said the insightful and inspiring John O’Donohue whose words and wisdom continue to shape and influence our path…..
…… so from a yellow hatted girl with a white floral wreath on our white door made with flowers dried and grown locally we are cleaning, out with the old, in with the new……
….. so for this new year’s, as with all our growing and future plans for our gardens, there is always the same hope and opportunity………
there is something deep in us that conspires with what wants to remain within safe boundaries and stay the same… Sometimes a period of preparation is necessary, where the idea of the beginning can gestate and refine itself; yet quite often we unnecessarily postpone and equivocate when we should simply take the risk and leap into a new beginning
Often when something is ending we discover within it the spore of new beginning, and a whole new train of possibility is in motion before we even realize it. When the heart is ready for a fresh beginning, unforeseen things can emerge. And in a sense, this is exactly what a beginning does. It is an opening for surprises. Surrounding the intention and the act of beginning, there are always exciting possibilities
Part of the art of living wisely is to learn to recognize and attend to such profound openings in one’s life.
….. wishing you peace and the happiest of new years from the Scottish 🏴 one and me x
WREATHS are subjected to the door test…….
……. well I am a botanist so there is plenty of practice and process and scientific research in the making…….
…… that explanation is far the the beautiful truth though of the door test for a wreath so I have said it in a few croaky words on stories -
….. are you a wreath door tester?
WREATH // thoughts on why we created our sustainable wreath’s …..
….. has me thinking of that insightful saying “You can’t run with the hare and the hounds” ……
……. for while I adore beautiful flowers I adore the winter of beautiful earth 🌍 more …….
…… seeking the brave - the fierce even - and the bold to shape a sustainable future with true seasonality ……
…… so here’s our Christmas wish- for everyone to be curious about where your flowers are grown, and then to choose seasonal beauty over aesthetic x
WREATHS // and the unwritten rule for florists…..
…… is that the last wreath is the one you make for yourself……
…… it’s interesting to me that it’s the last ……
….. my initial intention was that my own would be the first, then you start to make and, well, those wreaths marvellously move from a home on your door to someone else’s …..
……. as well as hats and hot water bottles, I remain beyond grateful for the heartfelt support of our sustainable wreath buyers…..
….. our wreaths are completely compostable, no bling, only string, ever hopeful of weaving a change in hearts and minds to true seasonality
…… so on a dark dreich day in Cheshire, be the light my dear flower friends. I may even create myself an everlasting dried wreath and hang in indoors, just for a change ……
WREATH // size of a small Labrador …..
….. was a description given once by a broad sheet journalist……
…… I confess attempting to tuck them into our postal boxes has been an art in itself……
……. we remain committed to our Labrador sized wreaths, complete with completely compostable everything……
…….. diolch to everyone who has ordered from us this year to support sustainable brilliantly British 🇬🇧 everything in our wreaths- voting for change by ordering our small Labrador wreaths brings us joy and hope …… all the best things are invented out of love 🥰….
WREATH // hops without the hangover…..
….. Carol .hops has sent us a box of her beautiful dried scented hops which adorn this wreath and another yet to be made …..
……. hops are also healing and I thought very apt to add as an ingredient for our local and lovely- and very skilled - dental practice in Nantwich
……. we are very very grateful x and if you’d like to see our wreath it’ll be in their door at Welsh Row
When your wreath matches your hat - yellow wreath for a healer who loves yellow- and ABBA
WREATH // No wires, no bling, as that’s not our thing…..
…….. our abilities lie with sustainability ….
……. we’re awash with green, so rather than seeming, we’re actually dreaming of ……
….. resilient restoration, our rallying cry ….
…. join our fierce endeavour and sever your old floral ways, our greatest hope is in our growing …..
… there’s of course an irony that to create with local sustainability at the heart of any business there’s usually more cost rather than less to source ethically and pay a living wage
…… the whoop of the swans 🦢 sustains our resilience though. Dried flowers adorn our Winter white swan wreath this year. One more sleep - do send me any final wreath orders tomorrow…
WREATH // …..making with a view and a few wreath making recommendations…….
…… as well as keeping warm, keep drinking…..
…… and while not quite time for the egg nog just yet - we’re on fresh ginger with lemon…..
…… keep organised- she says being g a messy creative- spend the time making your wreaths rather than hunting for the string- ours is always from the brilliant Shona
……. close your snips whenever you’re done, even for the shortest time, saving both plasters and expletives …..
…… and last but never least, make sure you create your bliss. I believe that you can see the joy in a wreath when it is made that way…..
…… 1 more day until we close our wreath order book, speak now or forever hold your peace, well, until next year [email protected]
WREATHS // …… and the one constant…..
……. change …….
….. although there’s a constant -4 in Cheshire and there’s a rather lovely constant of bringing the outside in ……
……. and no change either in our constant gathering of only Brilliantly British ingredients for this year’s wreath season - I do love to challenge the change concept 😂 ….
….. last orders no later than 8th December she calls as she did many years ago in a Cardiff pub …..
The object of the exercise is to persuade you to …….
…… and at this point I am going to slightly amend the quote from the marvellous Hugh Fearnley- Whittingstall - - or as we affectionately refer to him - Hugh “Double Barrelled“
……. the object of the exercise is to persuade you to grow more flowers. Many more flowers. And I hope to do so not by shouting from a soapbox, but through sheer temptation
……. and add to grow, to persuade to arrange and make and create with all the seasons that surround you ……
WREATH // White Swan 🦢 ……
…… our next hand made wreaths are being made for Cheshire pick up at the Wharf and delivery from 4th December
….. white Winter swan - 🦢- may be matching their increasingly Snow White cutting garden at that moment with our home grown honesty and this one had pine cones from next doors fallen tree
….. and if you’re celebrating solstice as we are, we’ll be making our florally forever wreaths- available for posting to keep with you for the rest of the year, and more …..
….. order from [email protected]
…. Oh and we’re aurora hunting, with warm hats, are you?
WREATHS // Every year we grow to create and make ….,.
….. for our wreaths. We choose flowers that like to grow in our soil, so butterflies 🦋 can dance and that we can dry too ….
….. soon we’ll celebrate solstice with our sustainable wreaths. The season shifts , the earth turns, and we rest. Just before we do, if you would love to celebrate too with one of our handmade garden grown, brilliantly British 🇬🇧 grown totally traceable wreaths ……
….. hops from .hops and eucalyptus from please do order for 4th December and we’ll make sure you have them by the following week ……
We create wreaths from Brilliantly British 🇬🇧 ingredients grown here…
…… our wreaths are seriously sustainable and are tied with string, not bling …..
….. we like to write the odd word to describe our wreaths, always in Welsh 🏴……
…… mainly though we’d love you to buy our wreaths for the love of our land, your land, all of the land everywhere …..
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…. for it’s deeds, my darlings, not words that ultimately make all the difference …..
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Red wreath for a red door but not just any old red wreath ……
…… this is one of our new 2023 wreaths named after our beloved bird the Red Robin - - or Brou-rhuddyn meaning scorched breast in Welsh ……
……. ancient language has such a beautiful way of linking historical myth and it’s why we name all our wreaths in Welsh , to root them in the land and connect them to my culture and thier home grown cultivation……
….. and of course we hope that the sustainable sentiment make sense to you too ###
On foraging, feasting and finding your bliss ….
….. I am all for the idea of foraging, for the idea of being able to seasonally gather, for the use what is already available and growing right here and now ……
….. as the years go by though I am going to advocate a phase of more frugal foraging …….
……. for if we all forage with wild abandon I fear we may forget what inspired us to forage in the first place …..
….. that thought led us here to stop using moss for any of our wreaths quite a few years ago for fear of all the woodlands being bereft of their natural footings. Being in good old Cheshire dairy land, we use straw and hay, a sort of vernacular architecture for our wreaths, I have no doubt that you will find your own ……
….. then when there’s something left, there’s enough for the wildlife to do thier feasting, and perhaps they may need some feasting for this winter……
….. who knows quite what the weather holds for Winter solstice. In the silent solitude of the striped garden, we love to celebrate with our own forever wreaths…..
…… contact [email protected] to enquire about your 2023 winter solstice wreath
On patience, peeling, and what you’re buying with one of our wreaths ……
……. well, here are our teasels that we gathered last year, grown by accident but loved none the less…..
….. the lunaria was grown on purpose though and we waited for 2 years while the glorious seed heads formed …….
…. and then we dried it hanging up in the Wharf waiting for weeks while the Scottish one attempted to avoid being caught up with the stems as they dehydrated …..
…. and if you’re a grower, oh you will know the time it takes to peel those beautiful iridescent pods ….
…. these are a few of the materials we grow, but not why we grow …..
….. back in 2016 when I said goodbye to AstraZeneca and wanted to create, I wanted to grow more than just the flowers. I wanted to cultivate wild edges and wild garlic and wild butterflies…..,
….. so when you order one of our brilliantly British, totally traceable wreaths, you have the opportunity to influence the direction of floristry, to choose sustainable practices, to change how things are done, as sometimes change is good ……
On Winter, white swans 🦢and when the best time to get your wreath……
…… “Snowy” our beloved and beautiful swan has been swimming passed……
….. and I agreed with another today that orders for wreaths are definitely earlier……
…… the truth of the matter is that a well done and well kept wreath will see you in for Valentine’s- not that I am advocating that you gift your Christmas wreath in February ….
…. our winter white 🦢 wreath, Ararch gyn y Gaeaf, is decorated with our home grown honesty, and honestly our wreaths are totally traceable and beautifully British 🇬🇧
….. order now [email protected]
Silent night …… as the power is out….. and a cautionary tale …..
…… there is not a sound from the house let alone a mouse ……
….. the peace has me thinking about the day. On world kindness day, there’s been an attempt at a scam here ……
……. And I emphasis emphatically an attempt…..
…… thank goodness for the canny Scot that is all I need to say……
…… so if you’d like to adorn your door with one of our Brilliantly British 🇬🇧 totally traceable Christmas wreaths, then we’d be delighted to create one for you, where we smile at you when you come along to pick one up at the Wharf having exchanged your hard earned cash for one of our unique hand crafted eco friendly creations- rather than the other way around as the scammer was attempting to persuade…..
Order now for pick up next week [email protected]
….. in the meantime hot water bottles and torch light 💡 is the order of the night
When Robins appear, loved ones are near…..
Red Robin - Brou-rhuddyn is our other wreath for Christmas
……. years ago, a clutch of robins was born here at the Wharf under a cyclamen leaf ……
…… however precarious it appeared that nest it worked - as does the blackbird 🐦⬛ nest permanently sited in the garage in an old gardening bag on a shelf ……
….. if you would like to Brilliantly British 🇬🇧 Totally Traceable wild garden style wreath for your door, send me a wee note [email protected]
If you'd like your Christmas wreath to be brilliantly British and totally traceable..............White Winter Swan - Ararch gyn y Gaeaf is one of the fresh Christmas wreaths we'll be creating this year........... the honesty is grown right here in our canalside cutting garden, honest ........ we’ve not seen the swans 🦢 recently but I’m hopeful they’ll be around to see their namesake wreath in our signature wild garden style for early availability w/c 20th November - we will make them until the ingredients are gone [email protected]
Christmas 🎄 wreath orders are being gratefully received now wreathing season is almost upon us ……
……. even as the squirrels 🐿️ are flying through the trees still …….
…… thank you for the orders that have arrived before we have even begun this season’s wreaths on our website……
…… so if you would like a totally traceable British 🇬🇧 wreath - and a quick cuppa at the Wharf when you collect, please contact [email protected] to arrange a date and time - this winter season for collection only at the Wharf.
…….we’ll be crafting with what we have gathered and grown, and decorating with ingredients that a few of our trusted and very sustainable friends have grown too eucalyptus steals the show for the scent of the season, always.
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Seasonal floral alchemy…..:
…. is foraging around the garden and finding autumn 🍂……
Circular futures……
…. as the northern hemisphere turns to darker times and the angle we’re at to the sun is very much the subject of scientific debate, there’s no question on one thing
….. we are heading towards winter…..
…… and in truth we’re always going through a circular floral future, one where things are grown then gathered then gone ….
…… and speaking of truths, almost all good things begin with terrible first experiences and eventually your favourite flower will perhaps suddenly become tricky to grow. The best thing about seasonal circularity? You can begin again and again and again- almost always a circular floral future….
Time and tide wait for no man - autumn 🍂 bouquet when winter approaches…..
And now here is my secret…….
…..a very simple secret:
……It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Always always hold onto your dreams……
…… on this day 60 years ago Martin Luther King said his inspirational words….
…… and whether larger or small, “I have a dream” is something that this dreamer believes matters always
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The Floret recommended daffodil list is out. The biggest surprise for me is what's NOT on it! . . . I talked about this in my post yesterday, and it finally landed in my Inbox at lunchtime today. The @floretflower list of 'must grow' varieties of daffodils and narcissus. . . The list is extensive. About 90 beautiful bulbs, superb for growing as cut flowers, are cited - many of which I already have blooming their spring socks off in my canalside cutting garden. . . However, for me one absolutely cracking daffodil - which I would always grow in my garden - is absent from the list. . . Watch the video to find out which indispensible daffodil classic comes with my highest recommendations. . . If you don't have my favourite in your garden you could pop over to @peter_nyssen where I think you can preorder for Autumn planting or you get on the list @sarahravensgarden or @jparkerbulbs to be notified when stock's in.
Daffodil bulb pre-order frenzy - what's your plan? ..... . . . @floretflowers is publishing her booklet of favourite narcissi varieties tomorrow. If you think shoes were flying off the shelfs with the lifting of lockdown restrictions today in the UK - then might there be a pre-order run on narcissi at all your favourite suppliers tomorrow? . . Watch the video to hear what I think about all this....
Tulips. Are they worth growing? . . . An internal debate I have with myself every season is whether I should grow those beautiful Spring blooms. After all, they are expensive, space occupying and work intensive. In the spring tulip season, good quality cut flowers can be supplied from local British flower growers like @smithandmunson to name but one. . . Watch through our video to find out where I am on this cutting garden dilemma. . . Music - "Floating Point" by @RoieShpigler under license from @artlist.io
I made this wild garden style sustainable spring bouquet from fresh british flowers gathered from my canalside cutting garden and I thought I would talk about all the seasonal floral ingredients that went into it in this video story.
A little chat before my live online class about tulip varieties and dahlia planting strategies.
Prepping for live online 1-2-1.
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