How Wye Grow Began: From Family Roots to Flower Rows

People often ask how Wye Grow started, and the truth is…it began long before the first seed ever touched the soil. I’ve always been a flower lover. Even as a child, I was happiest outdoors, hands in the earth, fascinated by the colours, scents and small miracles that unfold in a garden. Growing food for my family has always been second nature too — there’s something grounding about putting dinner on the table that you’ve grown yourself.

But perhaps it’s in my blood. My grandfather was the Head Gardener at Stockport Botanical Gardens, and his favourite flower was the dahlia. Those big, bold blooms were always his pride and joy, and I often think he’d smile at how many I now grow. In a way, every dahlia on my patch carries a little bit of him with it.

I moved to Herefordshire in 2017, and after we remodelled our entire house (a marathon in itself!), I finally turned my attention to the garden in 2019. What started as a family veg patch, feeding our growing brood, quickly became something more. The joy, the challenges, the rhythm of the seasons — it pulled me in deeper. By 2022, I took the leap and expanded into one of our fields, establishing what is now my half-acre flower patch.

It hasn’t all been idyllic rows of blooms, of course. I’ve battled a plague of wireworm, an army of leatherjackets, and what felt like a stormtrooper-sized battalion of rabbits. There have been summers of drought, autumns of relentless rain, and days when the weather — or the pests — won the battle. And I’ve done it all with two young children at my heels and a husband who occasionally helps… albeit slightly reluctantly.

But every challenge has been worth it. This little patch has grown into something I’m incredibly proud of — a place where flowers are nurtured with care, grown with respect for the land, and cut and gathered by hand. Wye Grow is my dream in bloom: rooted in family, fuelled by passion, and blossoming here in the beautiful Herefordshire countryside.

And truly, I’m only just getting started.....