My new book – The Crafted Garden

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cut flower patch, Frances Lincoln, homemade wreaths, inspired by nature, natural crafting, seasonal crafting, The Crafted Garden

My new book ©Jason Ingram

A heavy envelope which felt like it had books in it arrived the other day with the postmark of my publisher on it. It’s funny how after nearly two years in the making, and the pulling teeth process of editing which can make even the most committed of authors fall a little out of love with their book, the excitement is still there when you see all that work come together for the first time. It’s not as if the content comes as a surprise, you spend hours in front of a computer writing the words, there’s the time coming up with the ideas, in my case growing the plants to provide the material and there’s the photo shoots. Finally there’s the editing process. Time spent working with your editor and the designer marrying the photos and text together, and the juggling of it all to fit the layout and design of the book. Weeks and weeks of looking at PDFs and going through edited text can strip you of most of the passion and excitement you had when the book first started to form as an idea.

Fortunately there is a breathing space when it all goes quiet, the emails from the publisher stop and you return to a life no longer dictated to by your book. You stop waking up early, usually with a sudden jolt, worrying about whether you’ve spelt someone’s name correctly in the acknowledgments, or whether you remembered to send that urgent email about the photo that’s in the wrong place.

A spring project – The Crafted Garden ©Jason Ingram

Several months later the emails start again – publication date is drawing closer. Then a package, a book-shaped package, arrives and that excitement you felt all those months ago when you first starting working on the idea returns. It’s a little odd seeing all those long hours, the frustrations but also the fun times, staring back at you in book form. It’s a team effort to bring everything together and it was a delight to work with the very talented team behind my last book, editors Helen and Joanna, photographer Jason Ingram and designer Becky Clarke. Wellyman is also rather chuffed that some of his photos have made it into the book too.

The Crafted Garden brings together my love of gardening, crafting and nature. For me these three loves go hand in hand. Why buy a fake wreath to adorn your door when the natural materials to make a gorgeous seasonal wreath can be grown so easily in your garden or foraged from the hedgerows? Why buy Christmas decorations shipped in from the Far East when simple ways to festoon your house can be made from cones, lichen-covered twigs and evergreens collected on a winter woodland walk? They can be thrifty, fun to make, connect you and your home with the seasons, and they can be composted when the New Year arrives.

The Crafted Garden ©Jason Ingram

I think more and more people have grown tired of mass-manufactured products that have little or no charm, made in vast factories and shipped from the other side of the world in massive container ships. Many of us are rediscovering the pleasure in making our own or seeking out skilled craftspeople who make bespoke pieces. I think this is all a bit of a backlash against the homogeneity of the high street. Being creative is also good for us. Neuroscientists are looking into how creative tasks impact on the brain. It’s believed it can have an impact similar to meditation, and increasingly crafting is being used as a way to help people suffering from stress or mental health problems. Why do gardeners and florists regularly top the lists of people happiest in their jobs? Because there’s a real connection between a task and a visible outcome and in many cases the chance to be creative.

I’ve found crafting with natural ingredients has broadened my ideas about what I might grow in my garden or on my cut flower patch. I now regularly include flowers which dry well alongside those I pick fresh. I also look out for plants with great seed heads which I can save or pretty leaves for pressing.

The Crafted Garden ©Jason Ingram

For me it has also been a great way to beat those winter blues. Projects give the mind something to focus on as the light levels drop and by creating projects based on the seasons it has made me learn to appreciate what each season has to offer. I’ve always loved the weeks before Christmas and decorating my home but I can’t be the only one who really feels the gloom of January, the house bare after the winter festivities. But if you have some pots of paper white narcissi and flamboyant hippeastrums waiting in the wings to decorate a dining table or windowsill it’s amazing how they can lift the spirits and remind you spring isn’t far away.

The Crafted Garden is divided into the seasons with projects inspired by the plants and countryside of each. And, because I’m a gardener and plant lover, each project includes details of how to grow plants which could be used in the project with some other recommendations too. The projects range from ways to make your home look pretty, to floral fascinators perfect for a wedding or festival, with some ideas which would work as presents too. And there are ideas on how to craft and arrange flowers in a more environmentally friendly way. I’ve included a range of projects; some are very easy, others a little more complicated but still achievable. Lots of them are fantastic for crafting with children and inspiring them to appreciate nature.

The Crafted Garden is published on 3^rd September by Frances Lincoln and is available to preorder now from Frances Lincoln, Waterstones and Amazon.

A Sneaky Peek

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Frances Lincoln, Growing Cut Flowers, Jason Ingram, photo shoots, The Cut Flower Patch

The Cut Flower Patch

When I first started writing my blog one of the topics closest to my heart was growing cut flowers on my allotment. I have been a little quiet on the subject this year and that’s because I have been writing a book about it. Up until now I haven’t been able to say too much but at last I no longer have to keep it a secret. So I thought I’d tell you a little bit about it and give you a sneaky peek inside.

The book is called The Cut Flower Patch and it will be published on 6th March. Eeeeekkk!!! It’s all a little odd to be honest. This time last year I had just started the writing and had my first photo shoot. It’s hard to believe that I now have a finished book, I do find myself having to pinch myself. The book is a ‘how to’ guide to creating your own cut flower patch based on my own experiences over the last few years. When I first started growing flowers for cutting I thought I would need lots of space, which I didn’t have, for it to be successful, but it’s surprising what you can do even with a small patch of soil. The book covers everything from preparing a site and how to grow, to how to make your flowers last once picked. There is a whole section devoted to the flowers I’ve found to be the most productive and ideas about how to extend the cutting season using pickings from your garden and the hedgerows.

A section from Chapter 2 of The Cut Flower Patch

I love my cut flower patch, and it’s so addictive planning my list of what I want to grow next year. I really hope the book will inspire others to cut their own too. It frustrates me that so many flowers are flown half way around the globe. The environmental cost of this is huge. Then there’s the lack of any real choice, originality or seasonality. There are so many plants out there which make stunning cut flowers but we seem to be mainly offered lilies, chrysanthemums and carnations. There’s nothing wrong with any of these flowers as such but I’d like a bit of variety, blooms which reflect the seasons and ones which haven’t damaged the planet in the process. The theme of sustainability runs through the book with thrifty ideas of what to use as vases and using local suppliers and resources where possible.

A section taken from Chapter 9 of The Cut Flower Patch

Writing a book is an odd process. It has been fun, fascinating and at times frustrating. I feel really privileged to have had the opportunity. Like any other job, it comes with its stresses though. For a long period of time it is your baby and then you hand it over to the publisher and you realise it’s a collaboration where the finished product ends up a collection of ideas rather than just your own. I heard an interview with the crime writer Ian Rankin recently in which he said a draft copy of one of his books came back from the editor with a whole character removed from it!!! It can be quite a lonely process too. The ideas were in my head, it was up to me to produce the goods, and in the case of this book that meant not only the words but also the flowers. As a gardener I have always been fairly obsessed by the weather but that was taken to new levels this year. The coldest and latest spring on record followed by such a hot July played havoc with my plans. At times you start to take it personally. Growing flowers for cutting is really easy, growing them for a specific time when a photo shoot has been booked is a whole other ball game. I had small windows of opportunity for my flowers and the allotment to look their best which led to a few sleepless nights and moments of panic. Should I dead head and risk there being no new flowers or should I leave them and risk there being no new flowers. Planned photo shoots had to be rescheduled and there was a point in June when I did wonder if the plot would ever look like summer. But, in the end, it all worked out well and I’m really pleased with the final product. I have Jason Ingram, a wonderful photographer to thank for capturing the flowers and my allotment so beautifully. The photo shoots were one of the best bits of the whole process. Generally they went past in a frantic, lack of sleep induced blur but I loved them. When I have to leave my allotment behind some time in the next year or so it will be lovely to have such a beautiful record of the space I love so much.

A sneaky peek inside -Chapter 8 of The Cut Flower Patch

The night before the last photo shoot I went up to the plot to give everything a final water and to make sure it was looking at its best. The sense of relief that I was nearly there was almost overwhelming. Tomorrow would be the culmination of all my hard work. I allowed myself a few minutes where I felt a real sense of pride, and then panic took over. The site is quite visible from the main road, and although I hadn’t experienced any problems with vandalism other plots on the other side of the road had. A horrible thought suddenly struck me – ‘What would happen if my flowers were sabotaged over night?’. It sounds funny and more than a tad paranoid now when I look back but this was it, a year’s worth of work now in front of me. The idea that something could happen to it over night was too hard to contemplate. Wellyman, bless him, stayed watch at the plot until 11pm. He probably would have slept up there if I had let him but fortunately our rational brains kicked in and everything was where it needed to be the following day.

So, in less than 4 months the book will be out there, which is quite scary. Of course, that’s always the point but it was an abstract thought when I first started this. The other consequence will be I’ll no longer be just Wellywoman. My cover will be blown!! Oh yes, and I need to get use to the publicity stuff which doesn’t come particularly naturally. So I’d better not forget this bit.

The Cut Flower Patch is available to pre-order now on Amazon here in the UK and in America or from Waterstones. If you would prefer to buy from your local bookshop you can pre-order from there too.