My name is Jill and I started Little Park Flowers in 2015 after many years of being a full time mum to our three children. I began with just a few small flower beds and bags of enthusiasm and the business has grown beyond all recognition!

I now grow and sell cut flowers to my local community for everything from small thank you gifts to large weddings.

I have always been a keen gardener and photographer with a deep interest in the natural world. I was brought up in Africa and the Caribbean where we lived in bland and basic rented houses that needed to be made into homes. Wherever we lived, my mum would go out into the garden to pick fresh flowers  - exotic, tropical flowers like hibiscus, bougainvillea, canna lilies - and bring them indoors to decorate the house. I'm not sure I realized it at the time, but that simple act was such an important part of grounding us in each new place - wherever she put her flowers was our home....

Many years later, I discovered the joy of growing things myself and began to bring flowers into our own home. Throughout my adult life I have found happiness and rescue in the garden. It brings me enormous joy and grounds me in a way that is very hard to explain. Nurturing plants and getting your hands in the soil is definitely good for the soul…. When I work amongst my flowers I am always amazed, delighted and nourished by the sheer magic of them and the bees and the butterflies they sustain. 

Growing flowers and running a flower farming business can be incredibly challenging, especially when you try to do it in an environmentally thoughtful way. It isn't all about those romantic moments wandering amongst the rows of flowers on a sunny summer’s day. It is in fact extremely hard work throughout the year, often in the cold and dark and drizzle! In order for flowers to look their best and last the longest in the vase, they need to be nurtured carefully at every stage of their lives, sheltered from wind and cold, excessive heat or rain, protected from wildlife - the mice, the deer and the rabbits! - and often picked at dawn. 

In spite of all that, after many false starts along the way, I have finally found an occupation that combines absolutely everything that I love doing and I’ve never been happier! 

My ambition is to spread a bit of that happiness through my flowers and the workshops and events that I can host amongst them. 

All photos copyright Jill Houston