Seasonal British Flowers, May 2023

The last week of May has seen some glorious sunshine! Flowers are popping out left, right, and centre.
It was our toddler’s 2nd birthday this month (2!) and we have spent a lot of time outdoors splashing around in the paddling pool, or wandering around Longleat and The Newt in Somerset…great places to take children right on our doorstep.

My work year is starting to look pretty busy:
– We created an abundant floral table for a family photoshoot last weekend, it was so special, filled with all the colours of spring and plenty of blousy blooms (and cake).
– Our ever popular workshops are being booked for birthday parties – why not check out the workshop page? Workshops with me! See if anything takes your fancy, and remember – I will travel to you on a day convenient for your whole party.
– I’ve got an exciting wedding that I am freelancing for coming up in August – full of large installations, fresh and dried blooms, the whole shebang!
– I have meet and greets penned in the diary with local flower farmers, I only use British flowers and love to source as locally as possible so am always on the lookout for suppliers to connect with.
– And, last but not least, I have a wedding fair coming up – Looking Glass Wedding Fayre at The Laverton, Westbury, on September 3rd 2023 – perhaps I will see you there!

Last month I talked about growing roses… let me give you an update.
The couple I bought in new from the garden centre are all looking pretty happy, and one has quite a few buds forming on it, so I look forward to seeing the flowers soon!

I also moved some from another garden, these don’t look quite so happy. It’s all an experiment really and I note that on David Austin’s website they don’t offer bare root roses after April, and there’s probably a good reason for that… roses don’t like to be planted this late in the year. I am testimony to that, my roses are looking pretty sad. I also wasn’t sure if I should have cut them right back, including all this years new growth, but the answer to that is Yes, I should have. In case you’re ever in the same position. Hopefully they will pull through and recover! I’ll keep you posted.

Speaking of roses… I have been planting seeds in my husbands head about a rose farm in the future. He seems quite keen on becoming a rose growing specialist, wouldn’t that be amazing! Our own rose farm. It’s just an idea for now but we’ll see where it goes.
It has also been Chelsea flower show this week, which got us onto talking about what we would create if we ever entered that. This also feels like a long way off at the moment, but my husband is also a very creative gardener with grand ideas and a love of challenges, so you never know!
For now though, we have settled on buying tickets to Hampton Court Flower show in July, which we are thoroughly looking forward to.

The flowers blooming this month are:
– Alliums – poms poms of purples or white, real show stoppers.
– Alstroemeria – always.
– Astrantia – small spikey petalled blooms, really do look like little stars in your arrangements.
– Aquilegia – bell shaped flowers, multiple bobbing heads per stem. Wonderful cut flowers that will last in your bridal bouquet. The epitome of cottage garden flowers.
– Blue bells – it’s the end of the season now, but May saw some incredible displays of these dainty blue stems.
– Brodiaea – small delicate bluey purple flowers.
– Cornflowers – dainty and fluffy, perfect for achieving the cottage garden look.
– Cow Parsley – in every hedgerow, a good alternative to Gypsophila, available earlier in the year in abundance. Not long lasting as a cut flower though and needs to be kept in water, perfect for centrepieces.
– Lily of the Valley – perfect for dainty bridal bouquets, very expensive but so worth it.
– Enkianthus – dainty bells of pink and white.
– Limonium – just starting to come out, a really lovely filler with tiny flowers in large clusters.
– Orlaya – plates of delicate white flowers.
– Ornithogulums – small white flowers on spiked stems, accent flower.
– Peonies – the queen of flowers for May and June, everyone is talking about them right now. Huge blousy ruffles of petals, with a delicate scent.
– Ranunculus – limited but still available from Somerset farms near me.
– Roses – starting to really make an appearance now! No introduction needed.
– Snapdragons – spikes of large ruffled flowers, stunning.
– Solomon Seal – small white bells in a line.
– Stocks – another spike of large ruffly flowers with a amazing strong scent. Limited now though.
– Sweet Rocket – Cluster of small white and purple or pink flowers, they smell amazing.
– Sweet Williams – dianthus, beautiful fluffy filler flowers with lovely scent.


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