Plant your own Florist's garden

Want to save money and enjoy cut-flower varieties you won't find in the shops? Sow hardy annuals now and you'll have the pick of the bunch next year, says Hazel Sillver

- Hazel Sillver

ONE of the joys of having a garden is being able to pick a bunch of your own flowers. Whether it’s a small posy of sweet peas or an armful of annuals like cornflowers, nigella and scabious, it’s far more satisfying (and cheaper) than buying blooms from a shop.

Most hardy annuals that have a cutand-come-again habit (in other words, if you keep picking them, they’ll produce more blooms) can be sown now, either direct or under cover. Choose the flowers you want and decide where you want them to go – hardy annuals are great for filling gaps in the border that young shrubs and perennials have not yet grown into. Alternatively, many can be grown in containers; or you may prefer to create a small cut-flower area in the veg patch.

The advantage of sowing hardy annuals now, rather than waiting until spring, is twofold: not only will you get a crop of early flowers, but they’ll also be bigger. Cornflowers can soar to 4ft (1.2m) tall, rather than the usual 3ft (90cm), and the flowers will often be super-sized. However, you’ll need to wait until spring to sow half-hardy annuals (such as cosmos).

Longer stems