My business name confuses people – until I explain that my house used to be the sweetshop for the school a few doors down the road.
The previous owners kindly left us this photo of ‘Brenda’s’ in all its sugary pomp, given to them in turn by the eponymous shop lady when they moved in.
It’s at least 20 years since the house was a shop, but it is still held in great affection locally: gas meter readers and people who went to school in these parts fall into an instant reverie when I reveal which house I live in.
But it is not a shop anymore. It is my house and its garden forms part of my growing space. Where sweeties once lurked, now there are a couple of armchairs and a coffee table. The shop door has also shifted, long since bricked up and hidden by climbing plants.
In daydreamy moments, I sometimes imagine my living room transformed back into a space with a counter and buckets of flowers, or ponder small units available to rent on the high street. But then I remember why I came to be a flower grower, and realise why I can’t have a shop – not yet, anyway. A shop needs to be open at least 6 days a week and it needs to pay whatever the going rates for rent may be. It also needs me to stand there and sell things, to chat and to promote. And while I like doing all of these things, my first love is growing – and that’s what makes my flowers different too. Tying myself to a shop counter rather than to my current mucky-handed existence would make growing impossible, and then I’d just be ‘another florist’. Flowers, sadly, don’t just grow themselves. They’ll reward you only if you put in the hours and wear their stains on your hands.
All of this means that I don’t have buckets of flowers sitting around waiting to whipped into instant bouquets – instead it means that I have to go to the plot, inspect, select and pick whatever is looking most lovely for my orders. The flowers then need conditioning – a posh floristry term for a good rest and a long drink – before being made into bouquets and bunches. So I’m not just being slow when I say that bouquets need to be ordered by noon the day before delivery – it’s just how it is when I have to freshly pick the ingredients. The upside, of course, is that you get flowers which have hardly been out of water in their lives and the only way you could get fresher would be to pick them from your own garden!
A shop would perhaps allow me to establish a market presence more quickly. I certainly wouldn’t have to do the lugging involved in my regular farmers’ market stall, and I could even have a workshop space which wouldn’t need putting away every time I’ve finished a job. But I wouldn’t have these.
And I wouldn’t have such a flexible life.
And I wouldn’t be this happy.
But I would have clean, smooth hands. And a shop.
Maybe one day I’ll work out a way to have it all but in the meantime, if you’d like to order flowers from me and my not shop, get in touch!