Good Sustainable Floral Ideas
By FierceBlooms
Kathryn Cronin is a floral artisan, gardener and writer.
Her business, Fierceblooms, next to bridge 14 of the Shropshire Union canal, is rooted in florals that are as ethical as they are aesthetically beautiful.
What grows sustainably in the wild hedgerows and her Cheshire canalside cutting garden is her fierce inspiration.
She can be found often with her face close to the earth.
Whether you’re a sustainable business or not, and I am imagining that this would matter to you as much as it does to us, this was the year that was way beyond the usual resilience and resourcefulness that most of us who grow flowers needed to be.
You don’t need me to mention the impact of the global pandemic has been profound. That I do is because I believe there is both hope and opportunity for new beginnings from these dark and sad times.
I grow flowers. I create floral designs with the flowers I grow. I share my knowledge of how to grow and how to create. I have planted bare root roses in the sleet, barrowed loads of muck. Early starts are essential. The only way to effectively condition flowers is to pick them in the cool. Growing your own flowers is hard graft but there is no complaint here. None at all.
The question that could be legitimately asked is why. Why base a business around something that doesn’t last, and takes time, investment, land and a steely determination to keep going? My answer is because there is profound beauty in such fleeting flowers, and that is what is makes that beauty and those flowers so very precious.
The flowers are pretty precious to me, and to the bees, bats, butterflies, frogs, moles, birds and numerous crawling things that I don’t think about when I forget to put my gloves on. They are also precious to those who hold them in their arms marching down the aisle. Scent, season, colour and the wild of the garden can make us feel joyful. They are there for our darkest times too. That glimpse of hope that only nature can provide in those moments of saying goodbye.
In this time of epic change and loss, flowers are love and light. As it turns out, I am not the only one who has found this to be true. Back in the fear filled days of March 2020, I questioned whether there was any point sowing a seed in our canalside cutting garden. With lockdown though came a resurgence and interest in gardening. It appears it was not only my sanity, hope and purpose that were being sunk into the earth. Many of us were finding comfort, nurture and security in the reassuring heartbeat of nature. I sowed my seeds.
And our floral business? Well, it turns out that part of the solution was staring me in the face all the time. We may have needed to postpone our weddings. There was an absence of creating at our face to face workshops. Then one day, a consultant recovering from the virus asked for a virtual class. She wanted to spend time chatting about nurturing a creative practice, about floral life and a shared aesthetic of garden grown flowers that sit in their season, inspired by the fields and hedgerows and what is growing in my canalside garden. I have been running virtual classes ever since.
All flowers are not created equal though, at least in my eyes. Flowers flown and preserved in chemicals have a heavy carbon burden before they are even placed in a vase here. I am hopeful that this time has made us consider our global impact. The time when we could all hear the birds singing. I am hopeful that we can keep our promises made in those dark days of living a more conscious life. My hope is that our sustainable flowers can be part of that.
