Norfolk

We’ve been waiting until it felt right to promote our new range at Sandringham Estate Gift Shop. It didn’t seem ethical to be encouraging anyone to go out and about during a pandemic. But now feels like it might be time to properly introduce our Sandringham range.

We worked with Estate Manager, Kelly Smith, guided by HRH Prince Charles to create a range that complimented all the other beautiful products in the gift shop. Recently refurbished with a reuse and refurbish ethos, the products in-store are a mix of items made on the Sandringham Estate or from other companies in Norfolk. Some of our items are available on our website but most are exclusive to Sandringham. There’s crowns, buttonholes, wreaths, mini wreaths, bouquets and corsages.

Sustainability is key at Sandringham which chimes with us as we grow and dry the vast majority of the flowers we use. There’s something wonderful about seeing a product you’ve grown, crafted into something beautiful.

We’ve also had the privilege of creating dried flower displays for the restaurant and shop. You’ll be able to see these while you’re enjoying a Royal afternoon tea. Last year we added a small range of homeware items too, which we hope to expand this year.

This month Instagram is all about roses, feed’s are full of #rose posts featuring beautiful blooms (22,119, 749 hastags to date, check out Jaclyn Craigs‘ feed for daily rose inspo). And last month we (and Insta) were obsessed with peonies- bold and beautiful in equal measure. These two flowers represent the two sides to our business.

We’re a small family owned buiness, we grow and dry most of the flowers we use to make our products. Our roses are cut from our garden in Norfolk (and sometimes the neighbours’ gardens too!). We have around 17 rose bushes- some new, some very old. We have white, pink, orange, peach, yellow and red. Some of the little buds are no bigger than a five pence piece and some as large as a golf ball. We dry them in small batches and use them throughout the year. They’re homegrown and small scale.

By contrast our peonies are grown by my brother in a village called Parsons Drove (hence the name). Still on a relatively small scale compared to some but approx 2000 peonies in white, light pink and deep berry. We dry and store enough peonies to keep us going for the coming year but the majority are sent to the flower markets as fresh flowers (Spitalfields, Covent Garden, Brimingham etc). So the next time you’re scrowling through Insta Stories admiring pretty peonies, they might just be ours!

@parsonswreaths