From the Garden to the flower shop with love
This season has been a bit of a milestone for me. Alongside buying my first home, I’ve finally been able to create something I’ve dreamed about for a long time, my own flower and veggie garden. And for the first time, I’ve grown my own dahlias and zinnias from scratch. I have to say, I completely understand the obsession now.
Growing up in a flower shop has definitely shaped this love. Being surrounded by flowers every day made me fall in love with them early, but it also gave me an obsession with gardening itself, getting my hands in the soil, nurturing seedlings and tubers, and watching something so small slowly turn into something beautiful. That connection between growing and creating has always been there for me, and now it finally has space to grow at home.
Having the space to build a garden from the ground up has been incredibly special. What started as a simple idea has quickly turned into a thriving cut flower garden filled with seasonal blooms, alongside a small but growing vegetable patch. It’s become a place I’m constantly drawn to, whether it’s early in the morning before work or at the end of the day.
There’s something very different about cutting flowers you’ve grown yourself. It slows you down in the best way. You notice things you’d usually rush past, the first signs of a bud forming, the way the colours deepen as the days get warmer, and how no two stems are ever quite the same.
The dahlias have been the real show offs. Big, textural, and a little bit unpredictable, which I’ve come to love. Some have been perfect, others a bit wonky, but all of them feel special because they’ve come from the garden rather than a box. Watching them go from tuber to full bloom has been incredibly rewarding, and at times, a lesson in patience. They’ve quickly become a favourite in my seasonal flower arrangements.
The zinnias, on the other hand, have been the quiet achievers. They just keep going. Bright, cheerful, and surprisingly hardy, they’ve added so much colour to the garden and have been perfect for picking regularly. The more you cut them, the more they seem to give back, making them ideal for fresh flower bouquets and everyday arrangements.
It hasn’t all been smooth sailing. There’s been a fair share of trial and error, timing, spacing, watering, and learning what works and what definitely doesn’t. But that’s part of it. Growing your own flowers, especially here in Canberra, comes with its own challenges, and I’m learning more with every season.
Being able to incorporate homegrown stems into my work as a florist has been really special. Even in small ways, it adds a layer of meaning that’s hard to describe, but you can feel it. There’s something about locally grown flowers that just hits differently, they’re fresher, more seasonal, and more connected to the place they’ve come from.
This little garden experiment has well and truly turned into something more. From growing up in a flower shop to building my own dream home garden, growing my own cut flowers in Canberra, and now expanding into a seasonal flower and vegetable garden, I can already tell this is only the beginning. I’m so excited to keep growing more seasonal flowers and bringing even more locally grown blooms into my work.
