How to plan and grow a cut flower garden - Thrive (2024)

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1. Benefits for you

2. Introduction

3. Where to grow cut flowers

4. What cut flowers to grow

5. Creating a plan

6. How to grow cut flowers

7. Caring for your cut flower garden

8. Lucy Cox biography

Benefits for you

• Preparing the soil, planting and tending to a cut flower garden can be a workout, helping to burn calories and build muscle
• Growing your own flowers for cutting and bringing into the home can be a very satisfying process. It can provide sensory enjoyment outdoors and indoors
• You could make bouquets for others. Giving has been identified as one of the five ways to wellbeing

Introduction

A home picked flower arrangement

There are many good reasons to turn part of your outdoor space into a cut flower garden.

Growing your own flowers can be more economical than buying florist flowers. It also gives you a lot more choice when it comes to choosing what flowers to grow. You can also, hopefully, enjoy a steady supply of beautiful flower bouquets through the summer and early autumn!

Types of cut flower

Many different types of plant can be used for cut flowers - annuals (last one year only), perennials (last multiple years), climbers, and even shrubs and trees.

This article focuses on annual cut flowers. These are grown from seed in a dedicated cut flower bed. This is a great starting point for a cut flower garden. Annuals are sown and grown for one year and tend to produce lots of flowers. Once they've finished flowering, you can save the seed to use again the following year.

Growing annuals also allows you to experiment with a variety of different cut flowers each year if you like.

Where to grow cut flowers

Bright yellow sunflower heads

There are different ways you can create a cut flower area in your garden:

• You could adapt an existing flower bed to add cut flowers
• You could create a dedicated cut flower bed

If space allows, the advantage of creating a bed just for cut flowers is you can plan it more easily. You have a dedicated productive area, which can be edited each year as you choose.

A cut flower garden doesn’t have to be huge. A few metres square can produce a good amount of colourful cut flowers. But the bigger the better if you want a steady supply throughout the summer.

Ideally, your cut flower garden should have a sunny position, free from harsh winds.

What cut flowers to grow

Cornflowers in bloom. Photo credit - Jeanne blanch, Unsplash

A cost-effective way of growing cut flowers is from seed. There is a big selection of annual cut flower seed to choose from. Ready mixes of cut flower seed are available, or you can cherry-pick individual seed packets depending which colours, flower shapes and textures you find most appealing.

A great choice to add into the selection are ‘everlasting’ flowers. These have a papery texture and can last for years in a vase.

Below is a table showing the seed sowing, planting out and flowering times of a few popular cut flowers.

Creating a plan

A cut flower garden plan

Once you have chosen what you will grow, think about what your cut flower bed will look like overall.

Think about how big or tall the plants you have chosen will grow. The seed packet should tell you this. Broadly aim to sow the taller plants towards the back of the bed, through to the shortest at the front. Occasional irregularity can be introduced so that it looks more naturalistic.

You may find it helpful to use a pencil and paper to map out what will go where. Draw broad, overlapping, irregular sections. It doesn’t need to be perfect - the less perfect, the more natural it will look!

How to grow cut flowers

Sowing seeds into trays

Seeds that need to be sown indoors first will need starting earliest. Sow them according to the seed packet instructions. Our guide to sowing seeds in trays may be helpful.

If the seed packet says the plants can be sown directly into the ground, store them safely until it's the right time to sow outdoors.

Once you have chosen a suitable sunny area of ground for your cut flower garden, prepare the soil. Our guide to preparing beds and borders for planting has advice to help with this.

When you are ready to sow your seeds, or plant out the seeds you started indoors, refer to your plan. This will remind you what you are planning to plant where.

Use a cane or some dry sand to mark out the individual sowing sections.

Next, use a hoe to make shallow, parallel planting trenches in each section. Planting in lines like this will help distinguish the emerging seedlings from weed seedlings, as the ones you sow will emerge in lines.

Thinly sow the seeds in the trenches following the seed packet instructions. Do one section at a time and cover with soil.

If you are planting out seedlings, place them into their sections at the recommended spacing according to the seed packet. Our guide to planting out may help.

You may like to add plant labels to remind you what is in each section.

Once everything is planted and sown, use a watering can with a fine sprinkler head to water over the area well.

Caring for your cut flower garden

Masses of tulips in a flower bed

A few maintenance and care activities will keep your cut flower garden at its best.

Thinning seedlings

Once seedlings start to sprout, start to slowly thin them out. You do this by gently removing some seedlings, until the ones you have left are the distance apart advised on the seed packet. If plants are too crowded that can stop them growing successfully.

Weeding

Keep the area well weeded while the cut flowers grow and establish (put out strong roots and settle).

Staking

Some tall plants might need staking and tying in. Use small garden canes secured with garden twine as they get bigger to stop them from falling over.

Watering

Keep your cut flower garden well watered, particularly throughout the summer.

Cutting flowers

As soon as your flowers start to bloom, individual stems can be cut for bouquets. The more the flowers are cut, the more it encourages further blooms - a gift that keeps on giving!

Lucy Cox biography

Lucy Cox is a horticulturist based in Devon. She has worked all over the UK in various botanical gardens and for several conservation projects. She currently runs her own market garden and gardening business. In her spare time she likes to be in nature foraging, hiking and gardening.

www.harvestontheheath.co.uk