Making traditional potpourri with dried petals
Back in June I made some traditional potpourri using dried petals, orris root powder and essential oils when gardens photographer Nicola Stocken came to visit. I left it in a kilner jar in a warm place for the fragrance to develop, and (apart from shaking it a couple of times) forgot about it for four months!


I don’t think it would be polite to give away the recipe before she publishes it, but you can see there are roses, geraniums and dianthus in the mix of dried petals. The result is a good spicy fragrance of rose, and the flowers have not visibly deteriorated. You don’t need to leave it as long as I did – six weeks would have given a really good result, and two is quite usual.