An heirloom cutting garden – a patch of garden used primarily for cutting old fashioned flowers and arranging in vases – sounds kind of elitist. Like a prim and proper English lady who has a team of gardeners, and ventures out to the garden with a floppy straw hat with her ‘secateurs’ to cut flowers and placing them in her weathered English trug. The flowers are destined to be arranged in fabulous vases that will decorate her wonderful English Country home.

That scenario could be your reality! It isn’t hard to start an heirloom garden for antique flowers. Once you start one, it becomes easier in subsequent years, as you have the preliminary steps already accomplished, such as preparing the soil and laying down a weed barrier. It is just a matter of deciding what selections of seeds or plants that you would like to try, which is the fun part! I have tried so many, some were flops, but lots were very successful, and I have grown them in my cutting garden off and on for years. Perennial purists who will not allow an annual to enter their garden gate are missing out on the dizzying palette of flowers that bloom and die in one season.

When most perennials are on their last gasp in late summer, many annuals are still running strong with little care. A bit of dead heading, some support, and an infusion of fertilizer is enough to keep them in good form all summer. Some annuals like Poppies, Love in a Mist, Bells of Ireland, Clarkia, and Larkspur are definitely cool weather plants finished by June. See my post on Cool Season Annuals.

So Many to Choose From

Selecting the ones that will perform the best is key. Know your site requirements, indoor space for seedlings, and budget, are all important before ordering everything you like in a catalog. But I always order more that I think I need. Sometimes, you will have seedling failures, such as damping off, a fungal scourge of tiny seedlings, or any number of set backs, like bunnies invading your garden, and nibbling everything to the ground.

Also, it is really important to look at the quantity of seeds that you will be getting in a packet. Some companies will give you many more seeds for your buck, so compare prices between seed companies. Check at the end of this post for seed companies that I recommend.

What are Heirlooms?

Heirloom annuals will add long lasting color to your landscape and are non-hybrid, non-gmo, open-pollinated strains that have been around for at least 50 years, some for much longer. Nasturtiums, marigolds, cosmos, love-lies- bleeding, corn cockle, calendula, cornflower, larkspur, snapdragon. and clarkia, are just a sampling of the varieties out there. And because they are open pollinated, and not hybrids, that means you can save seed from year to year. Hybrids do not set seed true to their variety.

With all the new flashy intros of flowers, people forget the old-fashioned annuals that our grandmothers grew and enjoyed. ‘Flowers with a past’, or ‘flowers with history’ intrigue me even in the face of the preference of perennials in recent years. So many people when they hear that a plant is an annual, turn up their nose and dismiss it as not worth the time and money to plant. But I love annuals and they bloom all summer long, unlike perennials that bloom for just a couple of weeks. If you want all-season color in the garden, you really need to add annuals to your garden palette. Annuals are icing on the cake if you integrate them into your borders. But I like to have a separate area for my annuals and have created a meadow of them surrounding my beehives.

Some are easier than others to grow. Zinnias are one of my all-time favorites to scatter on the ground and like clockwork the seeds will germinate and bloom with little effort. Cultivated for thousands of years in the Americas, Zinnias are a true antique classic. According to Burpee’s website, “Zinnias are undemanding annuals that simply need full sun, warmth, and well-drained soil rich in organic matter. If soil is poor, incorporate lots of compost or leaf mold”. Like many old-fashioned annuals, Zinnias do better sown directly into the garden instead of being transplanted.

Seed Starting

But I also slave over starting seeds inside early, planting out when frost is no longer a problem, to obtain my choice of heirlooms. Check out my recent post on Seed Starting Made Easy. Starting your own seeds guarantees you a huge variety of plants that aren’t available in nurseries at a much lower cost and many of these heirlooms can only be started from seed. Nurseries don’t carry the plants as they perform better when sown directly into the garden. Poppies are a great example. With a diverse selection of plant material, a cutting garden can offer not just blooms, but interesting foliage, as well.

At its simplest, a cutting garden is just that – a garden used primarily for cutting flowers, to cut and bring inside to enjoy. I have established ornamental perennial borders that I cut from frequently as well, but a dedicated cutting garden gives you a separate space where you can remove broad swaths of fresh cuts to plunge into deep vases and enjoy.

A purely utilitarian space, it should be designed for usefulness as well as ease of maintenance. Since the  true cutting garden, unlike a mixed border, is all about the floral harvest, don’t worry about artistic plant combinations- simply plant for ease of maintenance, lay down a weed barrier, and provide support! Start small and manageable and gradually increase the size of your plot  as you become more confident with the maintenance. In the spring, your enthusiasm for a large garden might be something you regret at the height of summer heat.

Choose Your Location Wisely

Sunlight

The production of multitudes of flowers in a very short time severely drains and depletes the soil. So, choose a site in full sun, and work as much compost and fertilizer into the soil as you can before you fasten down any landscape fabric. Full sun means at least 6-8 hours of sun per day – the more the better. There are very few annuals for cutting that flourish in shade or partial shade.  

Water Access

Your cutting garden will require at least an inch of water of week in the absence of rain, so make sure a water source is convenient nearby. You don’t want to have to lug water cans over a distance to keep your flowers thriving.

Drainage

Look for an area that doesn’t hold standing water after a rainfall. You could build up a low lying area with compost if that is the only spot available. Raised beds are ideal for this type of situation as the raised areas drain quickly and warm up faster in the spring for planting.

Soil Health

You should get your soil tested first before you do anything so you know what nutrients, if any, are required. I actually had my soil tested and because of liberal use of compost over the years, my soil was fine and didn’t need amendments. If you have substandard soil, work in lots of compost and other organic material first. Once you add landscape cloth, adding compost is difficult, if not impossible.

Support

Many old-fashioned annuals are tall – 4 feet or more – so they will need support. The simplest way to add support is to add a simple mesh netting, supported by stakes to hold it taut about 2 feet above the ground. Add it when you plant your seedlings or seeds so they can grow up through the mesh and not flop. You could also use bamboo stakes, string, or I even used an old grid for a sliding glass door that I had on hand. But don’t wait until the plants flop over. By then it will be too late.

Weed Management 

A layer of landscape cloth for weed suppression is required if you don’t wish to pay for every blossom you cut with rivers of sweat produced by endless weeding. Choose a good quality landscape fabric that lets water through, is tough, and will last at least 5 years or longer. Don’t skimp on the cost of landscape cloth! Pin the landscape cloth down with soil staples and hammer them flush with the surface so they aren’t a tripping hazard. Make sure you can push a wheelbarrow through the rows for good access, or at the very least, room for walking through the plants for harvesting.

Ongoing Maintenance

Also, don’t forget that cutting gardens, once established, must be frequently clipped of flowers or new flowers won’t produce. Many varieties will cease flowering if allowed to go to seed. At the end of the season, you can let your flowers go to seed if you want seedlings in the spring that will pop up and grow without much attention. Or let them go to seed so you can save seed for next year. 

Save Costs

I regularly save seed from my heirlooms as that can save considerably on next year’s seed bills.

Give some thought to broadening your plant selection beyond common annuals, such as zinnias or marigolds. Most people seem to think that a cutting garden is primarily an annual one, and while it’s true that many favorite flowers for cutting are indeed annuals, a selection of perennials should be part of your toolbox, providing flowers year after year, without the need for yearly replanting. A great example is Yarrow, a perennial that I use for a filler. Or Feverfew, Tanacetium parthenium, which reliably comes up every year.

Feverfew in the lower right hand corner of the arrangement, adds a bright spot of white

Cutting and Arranging Tips

Cut your flowers just on the cusp of opening to get more vase life out of your fresh cuts. Use a sharp knife or pruners to get a clean cut and plunge them into water-filled buckets immediately. Carry your bucket out to the garden early in the morning to collect your flowers. If you wait until later to harvest, when the weather warms up, you might have drooping flowers to collect, instead of freshly opened ones.

Arranging

Before arranging in vases, remove all foliage below the water line as foliage can quickly cause bacteria to grow, lessening your vase life. I use a granular plant food as well and really notice the difference in flower longevity. Called ‘conditioning’, you can greatly increase your vase life by practicing these few steps. Finally, arrange in a pristine clean vase – the cleaner, the better.

When harvesting, be sure to include members of each of three general flower types: tall, spiky blooms, such as larkspur and liatris, disk shaped flowers like peonies, asters, and daisies, and small, lacy, fillers like forget me nots or baby’s breath. And don’t forget the bulb family. Tulips, which I treat like an annual, are one of my favorites and are ready to pick in early spring when annuals are still small transplants in the greenhouse. When you are ready to pick them, just pull up the entire plant, bulb and all, and cut the stem and discard the bulb.

I have never stopped growing these neglected blooms and invite other flower lovers to embrace them as well. Neglected but not forgotten, all these flowers should be planted and enjoyed by another generation.

Favorite Heirloom Annuals

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Heirloom Annuals I Grow

For my PDF on growing your own cut flowers, download ‘Cut Flower Recommendations’.

 

For sources, I recommend:

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Annie’s Annuals