A little bit of imagination

Sweet-peas slowly showing some life

I think I mentioned a while ago about 'British flower' hour on Twitter that I been having some fun with. Between 8pm & 9pm you can join in the conversation with the hash-tag #britishflowers. I've got chatting to a really wide range of people, from growers to other florists, allotment holders who are trying to grow flowers for the first time and also some well established businesses who are keen to promote the idea of British grown flowers.

I have found the conversations inspiring as people are keen to share ideas & tips that they have gathered. So I thought we would give it a go on our own and see where we get too.

Slightly healthier looking sweet peas.

You have to imagine these will be beautiful flowers

Going to be beautiful snap-dragon's come the Summer

So far we have sweet-peas growing, I've planted blue & white scabious, delphinium, zinnia, snap-dragon's, mint, sage & rosemary.

You have to have a lot of imagination at the moment as everything is so tiny and young, but as the weather seems to be warming up.......(said very hopefully) Things might start moving a bit faster, long term I would like to have a plot near our shop at Hartley but time permitting I'm starting the growing at home.

As well as all my growing efforts and through joining in the British flower hour I met a local grower Cally Smart who has been doing some fantastic work in our area, encouraging people to grow their own! Come the Summer we are planning that she will be able to supply us with locally grown flowers as-well. So if your around our area then do pop into Hartley Farm and see what's on offer in the Young Blooms Shop.

A Chelsea week...

Monday

Day off and a marvellous start to the week!

Tuesday ~ was all about Chelsea Flower Show and Oh my gosh do you not want one of these in your back garden! Chelsea never ceases to inspire me, I especially love the artisan gardens and this was one of the best! Inspired by the 'Far from the madding crowd' by Thomas Hardy, this scaled down Shepherds hut was designed as a writer's retreat! (all I am thinking is fabulous little summer retreat for me at the bottom of the garden :@)

Wednesday 


This was another favourite and I would dearly love to recreate it! Designed by Nikki Tibbles of Wild at Heart, this window box was part of her artisan retreat at Chelsea!! I loved it!!


 If you are getting married feel free to phone and ask for us to make window boxes like this for your great day!!

Thursday 
I ended up doing an emergency run out for cellophane and delightful old me couldn't resist the jubilee inspired ribbon!! What are you doing this weekend?? Are you beginning to feel patriotic and fabulous? My weekend will involve some pimms, a few weddings and the creation of our Queen out of flowers.....


Don't worry photos will follow I promise!

Friday
Who wouldn't want a bouquet of flowers turning up like this!! Laura and I were positively skipping round the workshop like kids in a sweet shop with all these glorious summer flowers to play with!! Yum yum!!

A rather unusual birthday cake!

Saturday 
Another glorious day of sunny weather and it was all about making this cake! This started out as a joke between me and a dear friend of mine whose birthday it was last week!! Seriously, the moral of this days story is be careful what you joke about!!

Sunday 

If I was rich and famous I would fill my house with peonies!! I absolutely love it when they start arriving into the workshop, their so elegant, fabulous and ridiculously girly!!

I spent Sunday in the sun with them next to me and a friend to help with a rather delicious bottle of rose and some rather nice cheese!!

Meet Alfie Veal!

    
Monday


Now who couldn't resist those eyes!! I went to visit some of my lovely friends but really I wanted to meet this little man! Alfie arrived on Sunday all the way from Wales, spent most of his first night howling but on my arrival was flat out asleep on his back in the sun!! (fear not more photos will follow)

A triumph of the floral kind....

Top table flowers

 This weekend has been a floral triumph. I won't tell you how many weddings we did.....safe to say they were all fabulous! Brides were gorgeous, flowers were stunning and safely delivered, the weather held (just) and we were a happy team of florists.


These are photos from one of the weddings. I love delphinium (tall blue flowers) the colour of them is just sensational and really stands out in the reception flowers. They work well in high-ceiling rooms and are certainly noticed in churches!!

For this wedding the Bride had three small cubes along the top table and to get the midnight blue colour in to the smaller arrangements had large beads wired in. This can be a very affective idea if your struggling to match your colour palette to flower choice

Pedestal arrangement for the church

The reception for this wedding was held at the fabulous Bowood house. There reception room is lovely and spacious and the tall delphinium worked well. Sometimes you can forget to encourage Brides to think about the overall affect of what flowers will look like.
So if your wanting statement flowers, think height and colour!!

Reception tables