Floral bliss retreat
Our first Floral Bliss Retreat at PepperHarrow was truly amazing! Despite the drizzle, we enjoyed a day of play and design on the farm. After a farm tour and foraging session, attendees dove into creating beautiful flower crowns guided by Jenn. A delightful catered lunch, centerpiece design, and a traditional English tea service added extra charm to the day. The retreat was a success, and we're thrilled to bring this unique experience to you again with even more special touches! 🌸🍵 #FloralBliss #FarmRetreat
Well, we had our first Floral Bliss Retreat this weekend and I have to say that it was totally amazing. We gathered together with a small group of people for a day of play and design on the farm. It was a drizzly day on the farm and created a calmly wonderful ambiance.
Adam and Jenn O’Neal - PepperHarrow farm
Photo By: Andraya Stender
We started the day with introductions followed by a personal tour of our farm. We then let everyone head out to harvest and forage at their leisure. It was cool to see what everyone gathered for their designs from the lovely perennials throughout our gardens to branches of unripened fruit and cattails.
With everyone’s amazing finds, Jenn began a session on the ins and outs of flower crown design. I think that was a sesh that everyone thoroughly enjoyed.
Jenn guiding a student with her design
Photo By: Andraya Stender
Donning beautiful floral crowns, we sat down to a wonderful catered lunch provided by Catering By Cyd. That was personally my favorite part because we got to sit with everyone and really get to know each other. And the lunch was amazing! Thumbs up to privately catered lunches. 👍 Catering in took a huge weight off of our shoulders with this event and enabled us to participate more!
Lovely catered lunch for the floral bliss retreat. Flowers And food forever!
After lunch we headed to the centerpiece design portion of the retreat. We loved seeing everyone dive into a full buffet of flowers and also how they incorporated their unique garden finds into their centerpieces. Apple branches and grape vines with little unripened fruits? Yes!
Attendees enjoying the flower bar
Photo By: Andraya Stender
Adam guiding the design portion of the workshop
Photo By: Andraya Stender
And if the day wasn’t already full enough, Jenn put together a lovely traditional English tea service for the retreat. We were inspired when we went to England and visited Chatsworth Gardens. While visiting, we sat down for a nice tea service in the café on the grounds. We had to bring that special experience with us back to PepperHarrow!
Teatime at PepperHarrow
Photo By: Andraya Stender
This retreat turned out amazing and we can’t wait to bring it to you again. We’re also excited with all the new ideas we have to make this experience even more special. Looking forward to the next one!
Rainy Day Weather. What Does a Flower Farmer Do?
Rainy days have slowed down field work, but they offer guilt-free time for business activities. Planning additions to the event space, Adam's construction skills come into play, while I focus on sourcing house plants, practicing floral design, seeding for the next flower planting, and managing various farm services. The rainy respite turns into a productive day for PepperHarrow! ☔💼 #FarmLife #BusinessPlanning
This early flower season has been incredibly rainy. It’s been tough to get out to the fields to plant, weed, and for the flowers to grow. In my most recent field check, I saw standing water in one of the dahlia fields and the corn cockle plants are melting into the ground. Boo! Please pray for some sunshine for the next few days. This rain is definitely rough!
However, the one good thing about the rain…it sure gives us lots of extra time to work on other business activities and it feels pretty guilt free. When it’s sunny and amazing out, it’s hard to sit down and do some of these tasks, but when it’s raining, it’s like a mental bluebird.
So, what are some of the business things we do when it’s raining outside? Well, today we’ve been planning out adding some additional elements to our event space. Adam’s the construction king, so he gets the honors of working with the workers who will make it happen and he also does all of the ordering for the parts and supplies we need.
I’ve been working on sourcing amazing house plants to have for the flower cottage, practicing floral design for fun (and pics), seeding more seeds for our second succession of flower planting, working on bridal and other event floral quotes, adding pages to Squarespace for additional services we’re offering on the farm, and working on scheduling some social media posts for the next few weeks. I could go on and on. It feels absolutely amazing!
Incredible Allium
Allium, a low-maintenance garden gem, often goes unnoticed. Its whimsical, lollipop-like blooms bring unique charm to the garden. At PepperHarrow, we use allium in spring bouquets and transform them into enchanting 'fairy wands' as they dry. Discover the versatile beauty of this overlooked flower! 🌸🍭 #GardenGems #AlliumBlooms
Allium often gets overlooked and doesn’t get the recognition or praise that it should in the garden. It’s a flower that people typically plant into their gardens and tend to forget, because it’s so low maintenance. Allium is one of those wonderful bulbs that you can plant into the ground and just walk away from. Can anything be better?!
Their perfectly formed little balls on top of their stem give them a whimsical and lollipop look. Shown below, the contrast of the purple of the allium with ninebark is unusual and stunning. The perfect contrast for true garden design.
Here at PepperHarrow, we use allium for all kinds of things. In the spring, we use them in bouquets for market, weddings, and sell them as single stem flowers (artists love them!). Towards late spring, they dry on the stem and transition into lovely ‘fairy wands’ as Adam calls them. Once dried, they can be hung upside down and stored for fall/winter use in wreaths, or also spray painted in all sorts of gorgeous colors to make an interesting dried bouquet of colorful flowers.
All About Roses!
It’s been a busy week at PepperHarrow with lots of rose pruning! Roses, especially David Austin varieties, hold a special place here. While not ideal for cut flowers due to a short vase life, their beauty and fragrance shine in weddings. Exploring other cultivars, Kordes varieties like Madam Annisette and First Crush impress with disease resistance and resilience to extreme weather. J Griffith Buck's roses, such as Quietness, stand out for hardiness and magnificent fragrance in the Midwest. #RoseGarden #FloralBeauty
It’s been a crazy week, full of lots of rose pruning and TLC. There as sooo many roses here at PepperHarrow, because they’re one of my favorite flowers. They don’t make particularly good cut flowers, because they just don’t have a very long vase life, but they just look absolutely gorgeous in weddings. They also have such a divine fragrance!
Admittedly, I have a lot of David Austin garden roses, here at PepperHarrow. I love all the varieties of old fashion, English roses they have available. Also, the fragrance is remarkable. David Austin roses are know for their romance and whimsy. However, now that I’m getting mature with my rose growing, I see that there are other cultivars that perform better for us, here in zone 5B, Central Iowa.
One of these varieties is Kordes. KOR-anything, as a general rule, are welcome here on our farm. They are extremely disease resistant and do really well with our extreme weather—really, really hot and really, really. cold. One of my favorite Kordes varieties are Madam Annisette and First Crush. Not only do they produce a prolific amount of blooms, but I can also enjoy their gorgeous foliage. Also, the blooms feel thicker and less likely to shatter after they’ve been cut.
Another favorite rose cultivar is anything from J Griffith Buck. These roses are known for their hardiness here in the midwest and perform amazingly! Quietness is one that I have growing at the flower farm. I have her front stage and center, outside of my house, in the cottage garden. Such a magnificent fragrance, fragile beauty, and great performer!
Special Flower Additions for 2019
We just returned from an inspiring trip with fellow flower enthusiasts! We held an Instagram live session answering questions about our new flowers for this year. Lavender, unique pansies, smilax vines, bush clematis, and pimpinella (Greater Burnet Saxifrage) are joining our lineup. Each brings its own charm to our farm, promising diverse and stunning bouquets. Experimenting with new varieties is a yearly delight, ensuring we offer the best blooms. What flowers are you excited about this year?
Adam and I just got back from a needed trip away from the farm and met up with our dearest flower friends. It was an incredible weekend of full of collaboration, best practice sharing, and lots of time was spent geeking out with other flower lovers over new plant varieties we’re growing this year. It’s funny to me that others obsess over flowers like I do, but I guess it’s not all that surprising. #plantaddictsunite
As a part of our meet-up, we held an Instagram live feed with ‘ask the flower farmer anything’. It was great to hear some of the thoughtful questions fellow plant enthusiasts have out there and I was thrilled to have an opportunity to respond to them. One of the questions that stuck with me in particular was a question about the new/special flowers that are being added to the flower farm this year. I told you that I ‘geek out’ and get excited about flowers, so I wanted to take an opportunity to address this in more detail and share some of the new things we’re trying this year.
Lavender
I’m not sure I need to write anything more about this flower. It’s just one of the loveliest, most fragrant flowers ever! The smell of these lovely plants is enough for me, but the added bonus of their gorgeous blooms just sends me over the edge. Can you imagine what a mass-planting of thousands of lavender plants is going to look like at maturity?
Pansies
These are not your momma’s pansies! We’re growing a variety specifically for cut flower cultivation, so the stems are long enough to go into a bouquet. These adorable blooms are going to grace early spring bouquets we will be selling on the farm and at farmer’s market. If all goes well, we’ll add them to the line-up and will continue to provide them in spring bouquets. Why spring only? Pansies are a cool weather loving flower, so as soon as the heat sets in, they fizzle out a bit.
Smilax
Such a crazy name for a pretty simple vine. This is one of the vines that florists use for weddings. It hold up pretty well out of water and looks absolutely gorgeous. I’ll admit, I’m a little intimidated by this one (starting from seed), because many other flower farmers told me the seedlings are pretty moody. Say a little prayer for me, that I can keep them alive. I’d love to have this available to share locally with other event florists and designers.
Bush Clematis
Where do I start with clematis? Oh.my.gosh. It’s so delicate and beautiful and floral design work. There are little things that differentiate a design and this is one of them. I sourced plugs in on this one instead of starting from seed, because they take a lot of time to grow. I’ll be trellising them, allowing them some support for their 5’ max height. They grow as a bush, so the plant will also have itself for a bit of support as it grows. Be on the lookout for pictures of this one, because I’m pretty sure it’ll be one of the first things I cut!
Pimpinella
Okay, so maybe not the best name ever, but trust me, GOOGLE it! Admittedly, I just had to go grab the seed packet, because I couldn’t remember its other name. It’s also know as: Greater Burnet Saxifrage. This looks like it’s related to one of my favorite filler flowers, Ammi. I’m growing ‘Rosea’, which I soured from Select Seeds and I can’t wait to use them to add a little airiness to my bouquets. It’s going to add that perfect touch of that wildflower look everyone is craving.
Every year we add a few things that are different and interesting. It’s fun to experiment to see what does well, or what doesn’t. We always grow more of the things that thrive and are easy to grow on our flower farm. For those things that don’t, we don’t ever keep them in the line up for the following year. As they say, variety is the spice of life, right?!
What are you growing this year that you’re excited about? Anything different and exciting, or maybe just something new to you that you haven’t grown before? Leave your comments below. We love flowers and can’t wait to hear from you!
-Jenn