British Flowers Week 2018: Not quite orange blossom

Today's post is about philadelpus, also known as mock orange because it has an incredible scent like orange blossom. It grows tall and it looks beautiful against a clear blue sky. It also looks gorgeous massed together in an arrangement.

It looks beautiful on its own or mixed with a couple of other colours. In the picture below it's with physocarpus.

Close up:

Here it is with delicate nigella (which I no longer have this year after a fox or two jumped all over them...I was not impressed!):

I wanted to use a Snapple bottle because of the Clueless line: "I gave him my lemon Snapple and I took his sucky Italian roast." The character Cher uses her unwanted thermos of coffee to try to set up two teachers on a coffee date.

This was for British Flowers Week a few years ago - with white alliums, jasmine, and ammi. The beautiful jar is orange blossom honey from Tiptree. And the lovely scent of mock orange and jasmine overpowers the not-so-nice scent of alliums!

British Flowers Week: A British flowers tea party

It was wonderful to fill up five buckets with flowers I've grown. Pink alliums, cornflower-blue cornflowers, strongly-scented roses...summer is well and truly here. I had to get the sprinkler out as the grass and shrubs were so parched - we've had a bit of drizzle the last few days, but it's so warm, it barely waters the plants before it evaporates.

I was so pleased to include my Bowl of Beauty peonies - they aren't scented, but they are showstoppers! This was the first one to open - if you are cutting yours, cut them just before they get to this stage.

The sixth bucket was filled with claret astrantia, drooping purple alliums, and blue-purple penstemon from Zest and white peonies from Pratley at New Covent Garden Market. You could tell it was British Flowers Week and wedding season, as the market was really buzzy when I went on Thursday, even though I went quite late (8am).

It was lovely to see a sea of Rosebie Morton British-grown roses at Zest.

I had a few flowers to do for a house party and so many left over, I was able to take some to a friend who I haven't seen for a year, and leave a couple of lonely bouquets on trains and train stations.

It was a great excuse to use a tea set (more on that on Alice Day, on the 4th of July) and to get a piece of rainbow cake from Cloud 9 in Brighton!

The philadelphus is looking gorgeous, and when I opened the door in the morning, I was hit with the smell of orange blossom (hence its common name, mock orange). So this Tiptree jar was perfect for a white posy of philadelphus, ammi, hesperis and alliums.

I have some Apollo irises that are a sunny yellow colour, and some orange and cream osteospermum. Not quite apricot, but this jar would have to do - and the peachy rose sat in one of many jars that I collect from people when they go out for scones!

The next date in your diary: Lonely Bouquet Day this Sunday, and an excuse to carry on using homegrown flowers!

British Flowers Week: Eggcups, the new jam jars

It's British Flowers Week again, and my summer flowers are filling my corner of South East London with colour, scent and texture.

Last week I filled three vases (and four eggcups) with them - from scented Harlequin sweet peas that I managed to grow from seed I saved last autumn to self-seeded and deliberately grown nigella, from pretty white alliums that were an experiment in planting unused onions to huge 'Galahad' delphiniums grown from seed, and from French lavender (bought in Mayfield Lavender) to British-grown French marigolds.

I love China blue and white, and so I used this Portmeirion vase and mixed a few blue nigella and flowering physocarpus with the white alliums, delphiniums, ammi majus, and hesperis.

This vase and matching eggcups are so cute - I thought the bright colours of the calendula, cornflowers and osteospermum would suit them. I don't think I'll tire of jam jar posies in a hurry, but eggcup flowers are a wonderful, miniature alternative.

And this lime green glass vase was made for summer flowers. There are plenty more to come. In the meantime, you can read more about British Flowers Week here.

British Flowers Week: British flowers at New Covent Garden Market

As British Flowers Week was launched by New Covent Garden Market, I have to share some photos of the wonderful British flowers that you can find there. If you weren't able to visit, you can see the website which is full of glorious photos of British flowers such as pinks and Sweet Williams, styled by some amazing florists such as Simon Lycett and Hybrid, as well as photos from florists and growers around the country. The launch on Monday was buzzing with people, and many of the flowers had sold out early on. A stand in the centre of the market was set up with photos of bouquets of British flowers, a display of boxed flowers from a competition run by the market, and a huge wallchart showing which British flowers are in season at different times of the year. You can see it here. Kathryn and Alastair from the market were on hand to welcome visitors with strawberries and cream and copies of the wallchart.

If you enter the flower market by the pedestrian entrance at Door 7, one of the first stands you will see is Pratley. You can tell straight away that British flowers is its speciality!

Pratley had plenty of beautiful summer flowers on Monday - Sarah Bernhardt peonies, stocks, all sorts of sweet peas (including a pretty salmon-pink one called Nancy), larkspur, delphiniums, bright red dahlias, pastel-coloured snapdragons, lime-green alchemilla mollis (lady's mantle), poppy seed heads, scabious, alliums, lisianthus, freeias, brodiaea, eryngium (sea holly, aka thistles), and pinks in different shades.

Last month, I visited the market with two flower farmers who had travelled all the way from the West Country - Fi from The Good Flower Company and Grace at Corfe Flowers. Helen Evans, the director of business development and support, who has worked at the market for almost twenty years, talked to us about the flower market in the UK, and British flowers in particular. She gave us a tour which was even better than the tour I went on as a student, because of Helen's vast knowledge and understanding of the issues that flower growers and florists face, and also because of Fi and Grace, who often identified flowers that I admired but didn't know.

Here are a few photos from that tour in mid-May, with British flowers and foliage on display at Pratley, Zest, Porters, and GB Foliage. There were late tulips, delphiniums, peonies, cornflowers, calla lilies (arum lilies), whitebeam, and gorgeous red-pink hawthorn.

There were also British sweet peas at S. Robert Allen, which is one of my favourite stands because of the brilliant way they group their flowers by colour. There is cerinthe at the front, which I tried in vain to grow, but that Fi and Grace have grown successfully!

The peonies at John Austin weren't British, but this display gives you an idea of the range of British peonies that are available during the short peony season here.

If you ask the traders in advance, I'm sure some would be able to source British flowers for you. Last summer, Dennis Edwards sold a fantastic array of dahlias by Withypitts Dahlias - I'm hoping he will again, as I missed out on buying them last year!