May 24th, 2015
Beautiful Yorkshire-grown blooms from the garden of Sarah Statham and James Reader
I promised to share an uniquely British-themed arrangement for this week’s Slow Flowers Challenge and the floral offerings you see here are indeed straight from the garden of Sarah Statham, my host these past four days.
Sarah is the owner of a wonderful enterprise called
Simply by Arrangement, a floral workshop-culinary experience created with her friend
Christie Buchanan.
I met Sarah “virtually” when introduced by
Gill Hodgson of
Flowers from the Farm. Gill is the champion behind the organization that promotes British flowers and the farmers and florists involved with the renaissance of their domestic floral industry (
sound familiar?). When I told Gill that I would be in England to tour the Chelsea Flower Show, she arranged an ambitious itinerary for me and my traveling companion, my mother Anita.
After four days in and around London, we headed to Northeast England with Sarah. She and her husband James hosted us at their lovely home in the Yorkshire village of Hebden Bridge.
We’ve had many wonderful moments together, including joining a gathering of the Yorkshire flower farmers and florists who are part of Flowers from the Farm. They graciously asked me to share the story of Slow Flowers and news of the American grown floral movement. And that was a rare privilege made more special by the service of afternoon tea, in the most proper fashion.
On Friday, Sarah gave me a pair of clippers and a bucket and let me loose in her garden. Together, we both designed truly local and seasonal Yorkshire arrangements to share with you here.
The green glass vase contains an exhuberant display of spring Yorkshire flowers – and captures a moment in time as I clipped and designed with flowers from Sarah and James’s garden.
The flowers and foliage used above in my bouquet include:
- White Centranthus ruber ‘Albus’
- A type of acid-green euphorbia
- Rodgersia foliage (large, dramatica and a beautiful dark rust color)
- Astrantia blooms (whitish-green)
- White bleeding heart (Dicentra) – flowers and foliage
- Meadow rue (Thalictrum) flowers
- Peach tulips
- Cirsium rivulare ‘Atropurpureum’ – a NEW perennial to me with deep burgundy, thistle-like flowers and long prickly foliage.
Cirsium rivulare ‘Atropurpureum’
Here’s Sarah, putting the finishing touches on her lovely design.
Sarah made me thoroughly envious when I saw her collection of vintage copper containers, including a few she picked up at a Chelsea Flower Show vendor who I’d completely overlooked. The copper informed her designs, as she opted for a sultry burgundy, plum and apricot palette.
It is stunning, as you can see below:
A copper-inspired bouquet by Sarah Statham – so gorgeous!!!
Here are the ingredients Sarah selected:
- Two types of Japanese maple foliage
- A variety of tulips, including peach, plum, white and almost-brown
- Geum with an apricot flower
- White Astrantia
- White-flowering Anthriscus sylvestris ‘Raven’s Wing’
Up close, Sarah’s design is completely shimmery.
The photo shoot: In the courtyard of Sarah’s ancient stone cottage in Yorkshire. So magical to be there!
This entry was posted
on Sunday, May 24th, 2015 at 2:51 am and is filed under Blog Posts, Creativity, floral design, Gardening, General, Plants, Playfulness, Slow Flowers Challenge.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
