It was early March 2020 when things started to go haywire in Charleston. Before I knew it, we were on lockdown—except the farm wasn’t on lockdown because we’re a farm and plants don’t stop growing. As wholesalers, we were considered essential workers, so after a few days of confusion, we resumed our normal operations. I drove daily around the city delivering flowers, and I’d marvel at how still everything was.
It was the quietest chaos I’ve ever witnessed.
This went on for weeks, and then the phone calls and emails started. “Please, do you allow visitors? I just need to see something beautiful.”
Aside from a couple interns and the odd workshop, I hadn’t allowed people to visit. The fields are surrounded in electric fencing. There are random holes. Snakes. Spiders gallore. Although I have liability insurance, it seemed safer to keep people away. But I just couldn’t do it this time.
I quietly invited them to the farm. “Do NOT tell anyone.”
Our fields were at their peak, and I just couldn’t say no. I had people shocked and grieving from losing family to the pandemic. I snuck a small family wedding into the back field—completely forbidden by my municipality, but….it’s done, and they’re married. If I could provide one moment of respite, I did it. Forbidden or not. Liability or not. It felt like a gift to me, to be able to offer that space to other people.
And here we are. Rapidly approaching a year, and many of us are still sticking close to home.
Where have you found your respite during this time?
We’ve since gone back to allowing no visitors, but the New Year brought with it a lightening bolt realization for me. There was no reason we couldn’t bring the flowers to you. Not yet cut, but growing.
Growing flowers specifically for the vase is very different than growing vegetables. It’s also very different than landscaping. While a cutting garden is still beautiful, it’s often designed with utilitarian motives to aid in growing and turning over beds for new plants once the old flowers are spent. What we can offer is not an “English cutting garden,” which leans more closely on perennials and expert landscaping than annuals and tucking as many plants as we possibly can into a space. It is a garden with form and function, and I suspect a cutting garden in your own yard will bring to you what it does to us - peace, humility, and bunches of beautiful blooms.
It’s with all of this in mind that we’re launching our home cutting garden services today.
Whether you’re a garden novice who wants a new hobby or a Master Gardener who wants to learn more about cut flowers specifically, we’re here to help. You’ll have vases of blooms for your home, but more than that, you’ll discover the joy of handing someone flowers grown at your own home, a uniquely special gift with all the love, care, and attention that goes into growing something from seed to vase.
THAT is MY joy, and I hope to be able to pass that joy forward to you.
Send us a note today, or invite us over for a consultation. Because there is no need to go out and hunt for the respite that you can create in your own backyard.