A huge thank you to everyone who came along and supported our open garden at the weekend for St John Ambulance. The sun was shining and the St John’s team did a fantastic job organising the event and serving lots of tea and cake.  Many thanks to Norfolk China Hire for supplying the tables and chairs and to everyone who made and donated cakes with a special mention for Hampton’s at The Barn for their delicious red velvet cake. Our thanks to Penny from Crown House Flowers for the beautiful floral displays and of course special thanks to our wonderful head gardener Dan for working so hard to ensure all the gardens looked so wonderful!

St John’s were delighted to raise £1,800 for their charity so once again many thanks!

Open Garden – Sunday 6th September 2015

We are delighted to be supporting the St John Ambulance Open Garden events for 2015.  Our garden will be open on Sunday 6th September from 1pm to 4pm so please do come along and support this great charity.  Home made refreshments will be available and Penny from Crown House Flowers will also be doing some flower arranging demonstrations.

 

Our first wedding!

This month we held our very first wedding at Swanton Morley House and Gardens and we were delighted to host it for Gavin and Hannah.

Gavin and Hannah planned a beautiful wedding with lots of lovely little touches.  They chose to have their wedding ceremony in our elegant ceremony room with family and close friends present to hear them exchange vows and with beautiful music and readings the service was very personal and intimate.

Hannah’s looked stunning in her very elegant satin and lace wedding dress and her bridesmaids looked gorgeous too in their lilac dresses.  Gavin and his grooms men were very dapper in steel blue suits, waistcoats and lemon bow-ties (and of course sunglasses – well it was a very sunny afternoon!).  But we must not forget Isaac (Gavin and Hannah’s little boy) who also looked gorgeous in his waistcoat and shorts.

After the ceremony it was Pimms on the terrace with lawn games available to keep guests entertained – perfect for a warm August afternoon. The wedding breakfast was held in our courtyard marquee which was decorated with potted trees and beautiful dusky pink lanterns.   With lots of laughter (and some tears) the speeches were first-class and set the evening up ready for great entertainment provided by Sophie G and the Good Times , a fantastic live band who had everyone up on their feet dancing the night away.

Flowers for weddings in August

Hannah asked for lots of colour with an English garden feel for her flowers and working closely with our in-house florist Penny she decided to use wooden crates (expertly made by Gavin) filled with beautiful blooms as the main flowers for the ceremony room.  We cut green and dark pink gladioli, purple and cream dahlias, blue, purple and white hydrangeas, blue agapanthus, and blue and pink salvia from our gardens to fill the crates and the jam jars which decorated the wedding breakfast tables. For foliage we used eucalyptus, purple sedums, oregano and nigella seed heads which were all again cut from our gardens.

Hannah’s and the bridesmaids bouquets were beautiful hand-tied arrangements which were made up with similar lilac and dusky pink colours and also included beautiful butter cream and lilac roses.  These gorgeous roses were also used for Gavin and his grooms men buttonholes and also to decorate the aisle chairs in the ceremony room.

With flowers also decorating the wonderful sponge wedding cake this was truly a wedding with beautiful blooms everywhere.

We wish Gavin and Hannah a lifetime of love and happiness and would like to thank them again for being such a wonderful couple and for being the first couple to get married at Swanton Morley House.  But let’s just have one more look at that dress!

 

July in the garden

Our gardens in July are full of hot colours provided by beautiful echinancea, heleniums and dahlias which contrast beautifully against the cool blues of the lavender, delphiniums and hydrangeas and our grass meadow, with its mowed paths, is a beautiful and tranquil addition to our garden in the summer months.  In July, the grasses reach their full height and start to turn a warm golden colour which is further enhanced by the golden light of the sunset.  Also looking lovely at this time of year are our various lavenders which we grow in abundance.  Our roses have also continued to bloom and with our dahlias starting to flower too for this month’s look at flowers for weddings in July, we had lots of fabulous blooms to choose from!

Flowers for weddings in July

Using our meadow as inspiration and together with our in-house florist Penny of Crown House Flowers, we decided to use the meadow as the backdrop for our wedding floral designs which were all made using flowers and foliage grown in our gardens.

Penny created a very pretty bouquet using a delicate peach double rose, together with sprays of a vintage cream rose.  The bouquet was finished with plums shades of astrantia, grasses, lavender and the tiny cream flowers from plum heuchera.

The colours and the flowers were repeated to create a stylish buttonhole and also to decorate our afternoon tea picnic area.

Our meadow, which is surrounded by many mature trees, has a lovely tranquil feel and is the perfect setting for any bride and groom who love the outdoors and would like some of their wedding celebrations outside.  Couples could choose to have part of their wedding ceremony in the meadow, set it up for an afternoon reception of gardens games with a festival feel or perhaps just create a little private space to take some time for light refreshments whilst have some photographs taken!

Fresh Floral Arrangements Workshop

We were delighted to welcome our guests to our recent flower workshop which we held just ahead of British Flower Week.

Using lots of flowers and foliage grown in our gardens, Penny guided participants through preparing and arranging a vase of flowers.  With lots of tips and advice on how to achieve different styles, our participants all made two arrangements using the techniques they had learnt in this hands on workshop.   The workshop also included coffee and cake and a tour of our gardens – such a relaxing and fun way to spend a morning!

For further details of our upcoming courses, please see our workshop page.

 

British Flower Week

We are delighted, this month, to be joining in with British Flower Week which is a nationwide campaign organised by New Covent Garden Market to support and promote British flowers and foliage.  So, for this months look at British flowers for weddings in June we thought we would do something extra special to celebrate this great event!

Flowers for Weddings in June

As the rhododendrons in our woodland garden are still looking magnificent, together with our in-house florist Penny we decided to use this area as our backdrop. Our wonderful woodland dining table was dressed with a stunning display of lady’s mantle, alliums (stipitatum), poppies (Patty’s Plum) and nepeta.  These flowers were used again to create an elegant vase arrangement in our circle garden.  We finished the look with scrumptious blueberry cakes, meringues and a glass of fizz – perfect for an afternoon tea Wedding celebration on a warm day in June!

All the flowers and foliage used were grown in our gardens and we hope the images give a feel for the colourful and beautiful displays which can be achieved using locally grown, seasonal blooms.

The second edition of the Marry in Norfolk magazine is now available and we are delighted to have a wedding flower article included as well as being featured in Norfolk’s new venues section.  This free publication is the ONLY official ceremony guide in Norfolk, produced by Archant in partnership with Norfolk County Council and is full of brilliant ideas, inspiration and tips to help you plan your wedding in Norfolk.  Marry in Norfolk is available from Norfolk County Council, Registration departments or from any of the EDP Wedding Shows in Norfolk.

May in the Garden

May’s weather has certainly been mixed this year but our glorious rhododendrons have certainly not disappointed us with their grand display of colour.  From mid-May they have been blooming in various shades of colour from pure white and delicate pinks through to bright and jazzy purples, reds and hot pinks.

May is such a wonderful month in the garden with all our deciduous trees coming into full leaf, the shades of fresh greens look wonderful with all the colour provided by the bluebells, lilacs, alliums, azaleas and of course the rhododendrons.  It has also been a very busy month for us showing lots of couples around our venue and gardens and discussing their wedding plans.  Our beautiful court-yard marquee has also been fitted this month and is now ready for couples to view and we are busy adding the finishing touches to this ready for our first wedding this August.

Flowers for Weddings in May

For this months look at British flowers to use for weddings in May and together with our florist Penny of Crown House Flowers we decided on a bright and colourful theme taking inspiration from all the bright colours which are currently on display in our gardens.

Penny created a wonderful vase of flowers using bright pink and orange rananculas, fragrant dark purple lilac, lavender blue nepeta, and the wonderful purple sensation alliums with their rich purple globed shaped flowers.  Foliage was provided by the greyish white felted leaves of lambs ears and large hosta leaves were used to wrap around the inside of the vase.

Penny also created a wrist corsage using a bright orange ranancula flower and an elegant acid green viburnum flower which were finished with a small spray of orangey-red broom and delicate purple tinted briza grass flowers.  Finally, and continuing with using rananculas as our focus flower, Penny also made a fabulous boutonnière with a rich dark pink shade of ranancula which was offset with sprays of nepeta, yew and ivy leaves.

This month we also welcomed guests for our Wedding Flowers Workshop where attendees were expertly guided through making hand-tied bouquets, buttonholes and corsages.  The workshop also included a tour of our gardens by Penny where attendees were able to cut some foliage for their own designs and pick-up lots of tips and guidance on flowers and foliage they could use at home and maybe already grow in their gardens.  Our next Wedding Flowers Workshop will be on Friday 11th September 2015 – please see our Workshops page for more information.

Finally, and with June just around the corner we are delighted to be supporting British Flower Week which runs from 15th to 19th June 2015.  As a warm-up we will be holding a Fresh Floral Arrangements Workshop on Friday 12th June 2015 where Penny will be guiding participants through how to prepare and arrange a stunning vase of flowers using seasonal flowers and foliage.   Further details on this course can again be found on our Workshops page.

 

Flowers for Weddings in April

April  has brought us some glorious sunny days and our beautiful gardens are certainly bursting into life now!  This month and together with our florist Penny, from Crown House Flowers, we were spoilt for choice when deciding on which flowers and foliage to use for our April wedding flowers arrangements.

The daffodils have put on a fantastic show this year and the delicate shades of pinks and white blossom on lots of trees is such a lovely sight.  As you walk through our gardens at this time of year you can also enjoy the wonderful scents from lots of flowers, including narcissus, hyacinths, osmanthus and, of course, the wonderful magnolias.

For our April wedding flowers we decided, in the end, on using the fabulously scented narcissus, plum and green shades of elegant hellebores flowers, white blossom and the delicate white star shaped flowers found on amelanciers.  For foliage we used sprays of broom and cotoneaster all of which we grow in our gardens.  Penny created two bridal bouquets, the first was a loose asymmetrical hand-tied arrangement containing the creamy-white clusters of the aptly named Bridal Crown narcissus and single and double flowering green and plum hellebores.  The second bouquet was a simple arrangement of Obdam narcissus which has large double blooms of cream and soft yellow and both bouquets were finished with long flowing ribbons – stunning!

Penny also used a hanging crown decorated with hellebores and rustic hanging jars filled with more hellebores, bridal crown narcissus and sprays of osmanthus, a very fragrant white flowering shrub, to decorate branches of our Lawson Cypress tree.   These arrangements would be perfect for any wedding in April and were all made using seasonal British grown flowers from our gardens at Swanton Morley House.

If you are interested in learning more about floristry using British grown flowers please have a look at our flower workshops or contact us for more details.

 

We are delighted to have received our Wedding Licence and are now an approved venue for marriage and civil partnership ceremonies!

We have already been showing lots of couples around our venue and our wonderful gardens and are very much looking forward to our first wedding in August this year.  If you are planning a wedding for 2016 or 2017, we would be delighted to show you around and discuss your wedding plans too so please do get in touch.

We also still have availability for 2015 so please do not hesitate to get in touch if you are looking for a wedding venue for this year.