Hello! I am super late this week, do excuse me. I’ve been at beautiful Charleston Festival of the Garden (which continues on all weekend) and am writing this on the train back. I was there to talk on stage with Mark Diacono about growing for flavour, in relation to his amazing upcoming book Abundance, which he initially wrote on his best selling substack and which you should absolutely be following if you’re not already. While I am peppering this post with links I should probably also mention that we talked about my own ‘A Year in Feasts & Foraging’ too. The whole event was a treat, lots of thoughtful talks and workshops set in the magnificent house and garden of Bloomsbury set artists Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell and their various friends, lovers and hangers on. Just all deliciously bohemian and artistic. More of which below…
This is our weekly community post in which we chart the seasons in their minutiae week by week by asking ourselves ‘what have I seen/done/eaten/made this week that felt particular to this week in the year?’ I tell you mine and then you tell me yours.
Here’s mine:
Hollyhocks
This is - honestly! - the only picture I took of the hollyhocks at Charleston, but I thought you might enjoy it… You have to zoom carefully to see them - no not that way! etc… The gardens at Charleston are chock full of hollyhocks and Melissa Perkins, who runs the festival, said that they have become a symbol of it, as their mass flowering always coincides with it. I was very lucky to have an after hours tour of the house with her and it was magical to see it and its beautiful glimpses out into the garden at dusk.
Our street is also blessed with hollyhocks, and they are at their prime this week. Presumably a few people started growing them in their front gardens and they started self seeding and now they erupt magnificently from every pavement crack. They must love our conditions but somehow I have none in my own garden. I will remedy.
That’s it from me, now over to you: what have to seen/done/leapt into/baked etc this week that felt particular to this week of the year?
Berries, berries, berries...mulberries, black raspberries, currants. The birds are reveling in their abundance. I have a mulberry tree practically reaching distance from my patio and I pick and eat them as I water my thirsty pots. Also heat and humidity a wicked summer in the US but we finally have a cold front and blessed rain and temps in the 70s.
The elder trees suddenly laden with clusters of little jade green berries, stems as purple as the berries will be in a few weeks.