Drying flowers in our workshop | Dried Flower Craft

Hanging up fresh flowers to dry

I love this time of year when there is so much floral abundance! I’m really lucky to be able to rent a large workshop with a really high ceiling to hang flowers from. It has a metal roll door which is great for drying flowers as it acts like a radiator when the sun shines on it. It’s not so good in the winter when it radiates cold instead! I’m afraid it’s very much not Instagrammable due to being full to the rafters with stock and being an old mechanics garage.

Gypsophila dried flowers and Eryngium

Gypsophila aka Baby’s breath dried flowers are a staple in my shop and I dry hundreds of bunches a year in white and natural pale pink. Also seen in this pic are Eryngium thistles aka Sea Holly – there are loads of different varieties and this one has dried to a more silver-grey than steely blue.

sea holly gypsophila flowers drying — Sea Holly and Gypsophila flowers drying

Ruscus dried foliage

Ruscus is also known as Butchers broom and is often used as a filler in floristry. The leafy stems are variable in size and are sometimes preserved rather than air dried to retain suppleness, and bleached. These leaves are quite large so it will be interesting to see if they dry well.

ruscus leaves drying — Ruscus leaves drying (this is the only plant on this page not UK grown – sourced from a florists wholesaler)

Achillea Cloth of Gold umbels

Achillea flowers provide a flat landing pad for pollinators, which makes them an interesting shape for floristry.

cloth of gold drying — Cloth of Gold drying

Sunflowers drying with pink Gyp

I find that Sunflowers aka Helianthus, always dry slightly untidy but this is just part of their charm!

sunflowers gyp drying — Sunflowers drying with pink gyp

Drying Cardoons, Dahlias and grasses

cardoons grasses dahlias drying — Cardoons, grasses and Dahlias drying

The Cardoons, Dahlias and grasses are all from my garden. The Dahlias darken in colour from fresh (pink) to dried (purple) – seen in the very top image on this page. In the pic above left to right there is some Wheat, a wild variety of Barley and some wild Oats. At the top of the pic are some Cardoons aka Artichoke thistles. Grasses self-seed at my place as a by-product of my job. They are also often planted by a squirrel who regularly visits the birdfeeders to steal wheat and sunflower seeds which she then plants!

Bunches of dried flowers

Here are some finished dried flowers. In the first picture there is Solidago (Goldenrod, left), purple Dahlias, white Achillea Pearl and Yellow Achillea Cloth of Gold (top right, back).

dried flowers from our workshop — Dried flowers from our workshop

In this second image there’s Eryngium (Sea Holly, left), Nigella (Love-in-a-Mist, centre) and Sunflowers (Helianthus). There’s more Dahlia, Achillea and Goldenrod just seen.

dried flowers uk grown — Dried flowers – UK grown

Dried flowers hanging tips

I talk about how to dry flowers at home in detail elsewhere, but here are two tips:

Plant stems tend to shrink as they dry, so if you tie them with an elastic band rather than string it will keep them held tight.
A cheap, quick and easy hanging method is to open a paperclip to hook into the elastic band and onto your hanging frame or line.

drying flower stems tip — Drying flower stems – tip

Buy these blooms

Some of these flowers are available to buy with limited stock via my shop – look for the words From our own workshop!