October 30th, 2021 - Autumn cottage garden, Autumn gardening, Cottage garden inspiration

I’ve recently discovered some online artificial flowers from Alex James

that I think are beautiful and look wonderful either on their own or mixed with a fresh supermarket bunch.

I aim to have a few flowers in the hall, living room and kitchen all year around and do that by having just two or three stems in a nice old vase.  You can see some of them here How to have cut flowers from your small garden

Newly discovered lifelike flowers

Up to now I’ve pooh poohed any kind of artificial flower or greenery.  I go around fingering arrangements in public places turning my nose up when I find a plastic leaf or a silk orchid.  Too many dirty dusty plastic flowers in the 1970s had made me rather snooty.  I doubt I’m the only one.

Lately though the artificial flowers on offer have transformed my opinion of them.

Here is my first attempt at a mixed vase

and

Real of artificial?

You can compare the two below

Artificial red rose

and

My current experiments with artificial flowers

Here a vase of a mixture of Alex’s flowers

and here is a vase with a few alstroemeria in water with added artificial clematis, soft peach rudbeckia, anemone and hellebores.

Here are half a bunch of supermarket roses mixed in with artificial nigella, lisianthus, astrantia and cosmos.

Vintage vase, roses, astrantia, nigella and cosmos

I particularly like the Aged pink rose

If I had such a lovely rose growing in the garden I wouldn’t want to cut it and thus shorten its life but now I can grow roses and cut a few now and then

AND have big blowsy ones for bigger vases.

I’m wondering what other people’s thoughts and opinions are about artificial flowers – I’d love to hear.

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Best wishes to all,  Julie