THE MODERN MINT BLOG
Lonely Bouquet Day
National Lonely Bouquet Day is tomorrow (Sunday 29th June) – an initiative that seeks to put a smile on the face of a stranger!
We love this idea. Having grown cut flowers in the past (and that really is a beautiful job) we applaud any idea that helps encourage people to get out and use flowers they might not have considered before. Flowers that are seasonal, smell great because they are fresh, are grown locally and, best of all, make a stranger happy.
If you want to take part in Lonely Bouquet Day, here is what you need to do…
1) Pick flowers fresh from the garden or forage straight from nature
2) Arrange the flowers in a small, recycled jar
3) Add a signature “take me!” tag
4) Leave the homegrown arrangement behind for a lucky local to take home. Voila! You have just delivered a handful of flowers that will surely put a smile on a stranger’s face.
We hope you support this wonderful project – go for it, cut some flowers and make someone smile!
(For a bouquet that seems to do the opposite of the aims of the Lonely Bouquet, take a look at this from our Chelsea Fringe project… that lonely bouquet is pretty sad by the end, right? That’s why we encourage you to spread the happiness tomorrow!)
If you are a complete novice with cut flowers, haven’t a clue where to begin, but are inspired enough to want to give it a go… you can always ask us for help. Other clients have… Cut Flower Garden.
Or these books below will give you a huge amount of information – we recommend you check them out!
The Cut Flower Patch: Grow your own cut flowers all year round
The Cutting Garden: Growing and Arranging Garden Flowers
(This one below is more about cut flower growing in the USA, but the lady who wrote it introduces great case studies from other growers – invaluable and inspiring tips about how to make your cutting patch work!)
And for those who have arranged flowers before and want something a little more exciting to work with… how funny are these florist snips…?
EBTS Boxwood Growers Forum
Through the European Boxwood and Topiary Society I worked with Chris Poole and Sue Mesher, members of the EBTS board, and we set up a Boxwood Growers Forum. This was to discuss how to make sure this wonderful topiary plant stays in the public conscioussness – we know many growers, suppliers and distributors have stopped selling it as the cost of replacing boxwood that has blight, or is nibbled by the boxwood caterpillar, makes it unviable to offer to clients and gardeners. But Boxwood is a phoenix plant, and there are ways to deal with the problems associated with Buxus. …
Modern Topiarist @ Garden Masterclass Poland
My video on Modern Topiary for Garden Masterclass has been translated into Polish, for the keen gardeners (and happy pruners!) of Garedn Masterclass in Poland. Tickets for the first showing and q and a were available here. But it will become available on the Garden Masterclass Poland website at some point in the near future – so if you are a keen clipper and want to know more, but speak Polish and not English, then I suggest you visit the website and get watching. (Of course, if you don’t speak English, you may not be able to read this…. hmmm… …
Topiary Hotline
The European Boxwood & Topiary Society are to run a Topiary Hotline for keen gardeners and people who love to clip. Date is tomorrow, April 16th 2024, and you can get a ticket for the Zoom meeting here – Topiary Hotline. Run by Chris Poole and myself, we set this up as an antidote to the huge amount of questions we have to answer about topiary throughout the summer. The plus is that their is an excitement around topiary and pruning. The problem is we need to help people in a better way… … so we will be giving people …