Natural Dyes

Wormwood is best known as the primary ingredient in absinthe, but is also an exceptionally versatile herb. As well as being an attractive plant to look at, this ancient crop has been used for centuries as a moth repellent, general pesticide and as a spray to repel slugs and snails.

The flavour of Russian Tarragon may not be so pronounced as its French counterpart but is it is a much more hardy plant that prefers poor soils and can cope with a bit of neglect. It produces lots of leaves, which can be used for a milder flavour.

The European woodland strawberry is the old fashioned wild strawberry once widely grown in gardens. Called 'Fraises des Bois' meaning literally Strawberries of the Forest, the compact plants give a good yield of small, intensely sweet little berries. A burst of true, scrumptious Strawberry that puts the taste of many bigger berries to shame.

This wonderful heritage variety of alpine Strawberry produces loads of little red strawberries that are bursting with flavour. Much sweeter than their traditional commercial cousins they possess a fine, old fashioned flavour. Plants have compact growth with few runners. An alpine Strawberry that is very hard to find, excellent for high altitude climates!

This pretty little wildflower is a slow growing, long-lived plant with attractive spikes of rich pink-mauve flowers that are very attractive to bees and butterflies as a nectar source. The flowers, which rise from dark green crinkly leaves, keep their colour throughout summer and look stunning when growing en-masse.

Rhubarb Victoria was introduced by Joseph Myatt of Deptford in 1837. It is one of the easiest to raise from seed and can usually start to be harvested one year after sowing. It produces sweet, juicy, medium sized green stalks with green-red leaves. A popular forcing variety being extremely productive for years.

Reseda odorata is an ancient plant with a long recorded history. 'Mignonette' has captured the hearts of gardeners and poets for centuries. The flowers are intensely fragrant, with a sweet and spicy scent, they make a wonderful addition to floral arrangements, even dried, the flowers retain their fragrance for several months.

The white form of the lovely Jacobs Ladder, named after the slender, fresh green leaflets arranged like the rungs of a ladder. Blooming in late spring to early summer, the bright foliage and white flowers will brighten shady locations. Both the flowers and the attractive ferny foliage are excellent for cutting.

'Morada de Amposta' is a large sweet onion named after the small Spanish town of Amposta. A heritage variety that produces attractive red-bronze onions, not too hot, with a pleasant, exceptional sweetness typical of Spanish onions. The beautiful, large globes weigh around 200 to 250 grams.

A very popular and reliable variety for well over 100 years, Onion 'Density 4' is ideally suited to our climate producing medium to large, globe shaped, straw coloured bulbs with pure white flesh and a good flavour. As a standard maincrop it offers excellent quality, high yields and a very good storage life.

Woad has been grown for its indigo-blue pigment and for its medicinal properties since the 13th century, recently capturing popular imagination as the blue dye for body paint used by the Celts. This fashionable plant has a fresh wildflower appearance that can brighten any garden.

'Kermesina' is an attractive and popular cultivar of Iris versicolor. Flowering from May through to July with claret-purple flowers with ruffled petals and bold purple veining. It may be grown in shallow standing water or moist shoreline soils and suitable to be grown in constantly moist humusy soils of a border.

Iris versicolor is one of the few species in garden cultivation. Although happiest at the waterside the plants will also perform well under average to moist border conditions. Flowering from May through to July, each stalk produces up to five violet-blue flowers with ruffled petals and bold purple veining.