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.

No use crying...

I saved my first, perfectly-formed delphinium to use in my new, second-hand vase. I arranged it with some white scented hesperis (sweet rocket), white roses and 'Nora Barlow' aquilegia from the garden and greenhouse. But as I turned around so I could move back to quickly photograph it, I heard a crash.

Gutted. After much cursing (sorry neighbours for the morning wake up call) I chucked the flowers in this old, first-hand vase, and they don't look nearly as good.

Mind you, despite being broken in the middle, the delphinium lasted another six days.

On the same morning as Vase-gate, I made a small posy of my flowers for Sara, the Garden Museum's sustainability trainee, who has just left to go on maternity leave. No disasters with that, fortunately! There were calendula, tagetes, aquilegia, and gorgeous-smelling sage and thyme.

And on Saturday I made a posy with another delphinium and my first few nigella.

Iris Day and the prettiest ranunculus

As we woke up (or not for those who stayed up all night) to the news of the election result on Friday and felt whatever feelings the results brought up for us personally, across the Channel, preparations were under way for something celebratory.

The iris is the mascot of Brussels, apparently, and so at the start of May each year, they have a festival to celebrate Iris Day. I think it fell on the Friday this year, with the festival on the Saturday and Sunday. I only heard about Iris Day on Friday night, and by coincidence I had been on the hunt for irises earlier that day! I wanted white ones but couldn't find them anywhere and so got purple ones from a florist.

I had ordered flowers from The Flower Union, a florist and grower of flowers just outside London, which they kindly delivered to the Garden Museum where I was to made a pedestal for a post-wedding party. I brought along ivy, hesperis and wild roses from the garden, and the irises (which were the only flowers that were specifically requested).

The Flower Union provided beautiful ranunculus in the softest pink and yellow shades, alstromeria, apple blossom, lilac, dainty white orlaya, viburnum, and pittosporum.

The flowers are each so beautiful. And the scent of roses started to fill up the windy porch.

There were a few stems left over, so I made up a little posy of ranunculus and hesperis to sit alongside the cake. The cake is safely hidden away in its box here, but I was given a sneak peak at it - it was a work of art! The mother of the bride had hand-painted birds and flowers all over the tiered cake.

This is the sort of wedding party I adore - family were helping set things up in the morning and it was lovely to meet some of them and to see how special the wedding and their family were to them.