Blog | Rose Red & Lavender

So much has been happening, I don’t know where to begin. I always promise myself that I will blog once a week. I don’t Its terrible.

We have been busy beavers over at the shop and have been making all sorts of mischief. Over the past coupla weeks we have totally transformed out outside space into a big, luscious garden. We have also planted a few thousand herbs, veggies and fruits just for you. We like to grow our own so we know its all good and organic, and we can grow all sorts of cool varieties that I never see on the market.

Mother’s Day is around the corner, I peeked in my back yard and saw the first roses. They always bloom around Mother’s Day. The market has been full of GEORGOUS! Peonies and I can’t get enough of them, Lilacs have also been coming around….but this year I have been mad about Hyacinths. Hyacinths have the sweetest scent and I have noticed an incredibly long vase life. We take a lot of care when processing them to make sure that they last extra long. Click here to place your order, we sell out.

Wedding season has begun and we are in full force production. I was excited to see that we where one of the few people selected to be in New York Magazine’s Summer 2012 issue. This beautiful headpiece is made of Wax Flower and Anenomies. I was inspired by some vintage headpieces that I had collected. These can be made and shipped overnight all over the country.

Press!! In addition, we were named as one of the top 10 garden centers in New York City by Time Out New York. I was shocked and incredibly honored to be on the same list as Jamali and the Garden center at New York Botanical Garden. Even happier because we didn’t need to have a mascot or some trendy gimmick to get there, just great plants, cool gifts, and sound advice.

Martha!! I was so excited to be on the Martha Stewart Show. OK, in the audience on the Martha Stewart Show. It was a special about Etsy and the great sellers there they featured a terrarium class that I taught at Etsy Labs. My mom was excited to see me on National Television but didn’t understand why I wasn’t interviewed and on the show more, thanks Mom.

Speaking of Mascots though…I love bees and our birds. Yesterday I had the pleasure of installing not one, but two packages of Bees. These are Italian honey bees shipped up from Georgia and they are chemical free. I am proud of my organic bees. We put a hive on the roof of our studio along side our Fruit trees that we just planted. Ok. Yes I hauled a few dozen fruit trees onto a

roof, but what the hell. A little exercise won’t kill me. I hope the bees will feel at home. I also put in an observation hive so that everyone can come and see the bees in action.

Tara, is my bee keeper partner. She grew up in Queens and has been keeping bees since she was a little girl, before it became all kinds of cool and trendy and she got me hooked on bees. Last year she got stung and discovered that she is allergic, after all, but was still a trooper and put on the white suite and ventured forward. I can’t wait for the honey and bees wax.

Moss Graffiti. We love moss and taught a fun class on how to paint with plants.

Robb put together a nice presentation and even played MC Hammer to get people inspired to make some graffiti.

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Last night we had the pleasure of teaching not one but two classes at Etsy Labs.
Nestled in a converted factory building in Dumbo, Etsy Labs is a wonderful place full of crafting treasures. All the work is done on huge, over-sized wooden tables and the walls are lined with all sorts of scissors, brushes, glitter, glue, screen-printing materials and more. I love it. Lavender and I have taken classes there and we really enjoy them its a lot of fun.

We were joined by Britta Riley of Windowfarms , Just Food, and Compost for Brooklyn to talk about all things green and good.

SEED BOMBS!

We were invited to teach about Terrariums and Seed Bombs there. Those are two of my favorite things!

Seed bombs are made with clay, organic matter and seeds. They were invented by native Americans who lived in nomadic tribes. The seed bombs are a way to insure that the seed will have enough moisture and food to grow if gardens are planted and not tended to. By doing this, the tribes were able to plant gardens, travel and come back to reap the rewards. They are perfect for chucking into some piece of land where access may be prohibited.

The clay acts as a binder and as a source for water and moisture. Clay retains water very well and slowly releases it to the seeds and little plants. The organic matter, compost or worm castings, feed the seeds.

Seed bombs can be placed on the surface of a pot to grow or they can be put in a tree pit or chucked into a vacant piece of land. If sowing “in the wild” so to speak, please make sure that you use native plants and not invasive species. What a way to get your Guerilla Garden going

How to make Seed Bombs.

Ingredients

• 2 parts garden soil
• 1 part Clay powder
• Worm castings or compost
• Seeds
• Water
• Trust and Love

1. To make clay powder, purchase red sculpting clay from an art supply store, cut it very thinly with a wire and let dry. Pulverize with a mallet or a meat grinder. This is the hardest part. I think about urban blight and pretty flowers when I am pounding clay. Old boyfriends, annoying room mates or a mean boss may be some other sources for inspiration.
2. Mix the soil and the clay together and sprinkle some worm castings on top. If using compost, then omit the worm castings and replace the soil with compost.
3. Add enough water to form a ball and have the materials bind together. Very similar to making a pastry crust. Not too much water, not too little, just enough to get it to stick together, add a little at a time.
4. Roll about 5 seeds onto each ball. Just 5 . maybe even 3. Remember that each little seed has the potential to grow into a plant.
5. Let dry for a couple of days and enjoy. Trust that your seeds will grow, and Love the beautiful gardens that you create.

Terrariums!

Wow, wow and just wow.

We have been making terrariums for a few years now and I am still overwhelmed by how popular these are and continue to be.

I haven’t gotten the official count yet, but from my estimate, we taught about 150 people how to make them yesterday.

It was BYOC (bring your own container) and people showed up with everything from 1 gallon jugs  to little test tubes. We made moss terrariums yesterday, just to keep it simple.

Here is how you make a moss terrarium. I must have repeated these steps about 50 150 times yesterday so I know it pretty well.

How to make a Terrarium

Ingredients

• Clear Glass Container, with or without a lid
• Rocks
• Sheet moss or Sphagnum Moss
• Charcoal
• Peat Moss
• More moss and Decor

1. Add a layer of rocks on the bottom. Make sure that you use clean rocks that are scaled with your container.
2. Add a barrier layer of sheet moss or sphagnum moss
3. Add a thin layer of charcoal
4. Add a layer of peat moss…
5. OK. Now let the fun begin. You can plant this with moss, lichens, decor, mini plants, what have you. MOSS MOSS and More MOSS!

I saw all sorts of things from a lady that looked like a mermaid in a terrarium, I call her the TERMAID, to little figurines.

I brought in some mini slate slabs that people colored with pencils. Those were pretty cool.

As always, we are available for any of your terrarium questions.

Check out the fun action below.

ps. a certain film crew from a certain tv show that has the initials MSL was there documenting the whole event. Can’t wait to see the footage!

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My parents live in West Virginia, near the Maryland border. Their property sits on the site of an old tomato and melon farm. There was once a thriving tomato industry in their area but the local farmers could not compete with the big factory farms in California so they went out of business. Unfortunately, the farmers used chemical fertilizers which left the soil depleted of organic materials and nutrients and pretty poor. It has been siting fallow for about 20 years.

They said that nothing can grow there but offered to give me a small piece of land to try to grow something if I could, I saw it as a horticultural challenge.

I fell in love with lavender when I first visited the south of France and had the opportunity to visit lavender fields while it was in full bloom. My parents had seeded their property with wildflowers and registered their property as a wildflower farm and lavender seemed like a good fit. Lavender loves to be planted in well draining soil on a slope without many nutrients. It doesn’t need much maintenance, water, pest control or fertilizer and if planted correctly, can be maintained by mowing in between rows a couple of times a year. Turns out it loves it in the mountains of West Virginia where there are hot dry summers and lots of silty, rocky soil. It also tolerates being ignored by my parents. We planted a few thousand plants on mother’s day a few years ago and it has thrived.

While you spend the 4th chomping on hotdogs or fauxdawgs trying to keep cool, we spent the holiday weekends at our flower farm in West By God Virginia picking lavender from our fields in triple digit weather. Yea Haw! Our lavender is grown without the use of chemicals or pesticides and is perfect for use in your home or for cooking.

Here is a great recipe for Lavender Sorbet

Lavender Sorbet

The vodka in the recipe makes it very soft. It’s not the kind of iced dessert you scoop into an oversized waffle cone. It’s a slushy, uncooperative dish that, in small doses, will refresh your heat-addled senses. While this style of sorbet is similar to the palate cleansers served at high-end restaurants between courses, I like it as a mid-afternoon refresher on a scorching hot summer day.

Makes 4 very small servings

1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup water
1 heaping teaspoon fresh lavender flowers (food grade only*)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon vodka
In a small sauce pan, dissolve sugar and water over medium heat.
Stir in lavender. Bring to a boil then quickly reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes.
Allow to cool for 10 to 15 minutes, then strain lavender syrup through a fine sieve.
Stir in lemon juice and vodka.
If you have an ice cream maker, make the sorbet according to the manufacturer’s directions.
Otherwise, pour the syrup into a flat-bottomed glass dish, cover, and freeze until semi-solid. Break the sorbet up with a fork and freeze until solid. Place frozen sorbet in a food processor or blender and blend until smooth. Cover and refreeze until ready to serve.

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Its almost St. Patrick’s day and time to plant potatoes.

My mother always told me that you plant potatoes on st. patricks day. She said thats because the irish love to eat potatoes. She lived in zone 6 in the Appalachian Mountains and by words of wisdom, that is too early for them, but thats what they did and it seemed to work, she ate lots of potatoes growing up.

We live in zone 7 so St. Patrick’s day is just right.

I have a bag of potatoes on my counter and they all have sprouts, maybe they know something I don’t.

Potatoes, are one of my favorite things to grow.

I get small potatoes at the farmer’s market and soak them in water for a little then put them in a warm place in a paper bag to sprout.

After they sprout, I cut them into quarters or plant them whole (if they are tiny) into the place I want to grow them, about 12″ apart, 3-4 inches deep.

Not all soil is equal in Brooklyn and I did read in a NYT article that potatoes grown in soil that may have lead are ok to eat as long as you wash them. That being said though, it is much, much easier to plant potatoes in a container and just empty the contents of the container at the end of the growing season (after the plants turn yellow) and pick out your potatoes. I almost always miss and damage some when I dig them out.

Sometimes, I get antsy and shove my hand under the plant and steal a few during the growing season. The plants don’t seem to mind and I get really tasty new potatoes that are amazing.

Once in awhile I have had problems with Potato Bugs, I have found that planting potatoes with marigolds has kept them away.

Five gallon buckets make great containers for potatoes as do trash cans or a large bag of soil, just cut some slits in the bag and plant your potaoes, isn’t that easy?

Another method is to plant your potatoes in a tire and as the plant grows, keep stacking tires on top of the plants and add more soil, compost, old leaves, hay, shredded newspaper, well you get the idea. At the end of the season, take away the tires and pick out your potatoes.

Potatoes like either a high or low PH soil. Low PH will make a more waxy texture potato and High PH will make a more dry-textured potato. Think pine needles, citrus rinds, eggshells and sulfur, for low ph, think vegetable fats (avocado peels) and lime (the powdered type) for a high ph.

They really are super easy and taste oh so much better than the ones you get at C-Town. I saw a few volunteer plants growing out of my compost bin last year, I can’t wait to see what grew when I turn the compost this week.

Thats, my 2 cents, try them, they are fun to grow.

Kimberly Sevilla

Rose Red & Lavender
Flowers Plants, and Beautiful Things

653 Metropolitan Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11211

www.roseredandlavender.com

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Seeds, seeds, seeds.

I love seeds. I really do. I like looking at the catalogs, reading all the descriptions, trying all the varieties, saving seeds, collecting seeds, trading seeds. I love talking to seed growers and getting all nerdy about all the different cultivators and reminiscing. When we say Brandywine, or Moon and Stars, Even Freckles and Deer Tounge, we smile, because we know what that means an we all have our favorites.

If you haven’t tried it, using seeds to start your garden can be very rewarding. There are so many varieties that just wouldn’t be available to you if you didn’t grow them yourself, even things that (gasp) would not be available at the Farmer’s market. I know, I know, they seem to have everything but there are some bizarro things out there, Purple, Conical Cauliflower?. Lettuce, radishes, and beans and sunflowers are very easy and if you are timid, I suggest you start with those.

We teach a few classes on how to start seeds. I am always proud when my students come back and show me pictures of what they grew. One of my very first students moved on to create his own Roof Top Seed company, I am so proud.

I personally have tried almost every method of seed starting and there are two that I will swear by, ok, three that I swear by. These are; winter sowing, jiffy pellets, and baby beds.

Seeds are a miracle and once water is added, the whole process of life begins. Have you watched your garden in the spring, and notice how bare the earth is, and suddenly, after a warm day, life pops up out of nowhere? Weeds, weeds, weeds and lots of them. No one mollycoddles these plants, no one sets up growlights or painstakingly cares for them and yet they grow. Whaddup with that? Sometimes you will notice that the seedlings look a little familiar and many times, healthier, but smaller versions of ones you started in your home weeks before. Those volunteer tomato plants, sunflowers, and herbs just pop up, all on their own. Get Out! These seeds rest in the ground all winter and when the time is right, for them, POP! I have noticed that the volunteer plants almost always catch up to the ones I started, and even out grow them, not fair.

There is a method called Winter Sowing. Basically, you take your seed starting kit, take out container, milk jug or what have you and you plant your seeds, water them, and place the whole thing outside, in the middle of winter, in the snow. When the time is right for those seeds to grow, they will, with no help from you, and they will thrive and be healthy. Just be sure to water them when the weather warms up. The cold kills any of the damp-off fungi, and also helps striate hard seed coats. This is the only way that I have been able to successfully grow Lupins and Columbine (both native plants) from seed. Funny enough, tomatoes, and peppers also do very well using this method. It may not be as much fun as starting them inside, but you will get good results.When the seedlings are large enough, you just move them to where you would like them to be in the garden.Yes, it is that easy. You don’t need to worry about planting charts, frost dates, grow lights….ect. They will grow when they are ready to, it almost takes all the fun out of it.

Jiffy pellets, I love, love, love them. Before I had a garden in the city, I had one in the country in upstate New York and I would grow my seedlings at home; first in a walkup in Alphabet City, and then in a real grown up’s apartment in Park Slope, even in the hatchback of my Saab, which was a terrific greenhouse, as well as a fun car.

Starting seeds can be messy and the fine seed starting mix can go everywhere. Filling the trays is a hassle and it always makes a mess. One year I discovered Jiffy 7′s and I was hooked. Jiffy’s are little disks of peat-moss that are flat, but when you add water, they pop up into little pots that are surrounded by netting. Storage is easy and they last forever.

Put three seeds in a little pot, cover with a clear lid and wait for your seeds to sprout. Take off the lid and watch your plants grow. When you transplant, move the pot into the soil, its that easy. Sometimes I rip off the little net, sometimes not. These pellets come in little mini greenhouses with 6, 12, 20 or 72 pellets. 72 will fit into a full tray, and they work great in combination with the plastic 6 packs that come with the 72 cell greenhouses. 72 plants! once you get started, you will want more, and more and more….

Other methods, peat pots, newspaper cups, the paper towel, ect…. never worked out that great for me and I always had watering issues, mold (especially with the newspaper cups) and general poor performance.

The last method that I like is similar to the winter gardening method but uses a cold frame instead of individual containers. You basically set up a small raised bed, about 2′ x 4′ and fill it with a light mixture of vermiculite and peat or coir with some sand. 3 parts peat or coir to one part sand and one part vermiculite. A 15g smartpot would also do well.

Plant your seeds, well spaced, in little rows, don’t forget to label them. When the plants are big enough, use a transplant trowel (skinny and thin) and move them to where you want them. If you like you can cover the box with plastic hoops or with an old window or piece of glass, creating a cold frame. Don’t forget to prop it open on sunny days or you will have an oven.

The backs of seed packets have lots of great information. Ignore most of the planting instructions, except for if it tells you to direct sow, some seedlings don’t like to be moved around much. Remember to always space your seeds, each seed has the potential of becoming a little plant. A pack of lettuce seed can have up to 400 seeds, so avoid at all costs, making a little furrow and sprinkling all the seeds in that furrow. Thinning is a waste of time, and a waste of seed, and it is damages the plants. Its always best to put 3 seeds in a spot, every few inches. One out of three is bound to grow.

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We Have been up to our EYEBALLS with Valentine’s Flowers and are sooo so excited about this year.

Here are some special offerings that go beyond red roses. If you love red roses, and we do to, our classics are the best that you can find and once you see them, you will know why they are a classic. Order early because we sell out. Sorry to the young men who I had to turn away last year after 3:00.

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Aren’t these pretty? We used Herbs, A ton of Herbs for this post Thanksgiving Wedding. Sara Seber, the excellent wedding planner and owner of Indelible Times acted as my wingman and helped me set up hundreds of herbs and hundreds of candles.

When we went to pin the boutonnieres on the groomsmen, Carolina’s fiance asked if we saw her and how she looked. I said that Carolina looked beautiful, and he had the biggest smile I have ever seen. Carolina, you are one lucky lady.

This past weekend we had the pleasure of working with Roberta’s at the Green Building. One of our favorites, the staff is always super nice. The girls looked extra cute in their vintage outfits and everyone had more than a little style and pizazz. These wood farm tables and rustic napkins were perfect. With the smell of all the herbs, especially the lavender, I felt like I was in France.

They even brought in a portable, wood fired pizza oven! I know that the food was fantastic. I wish I could have stayed.

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Did someone say RED?

We had the pleasure of fitting out an all RED wedding at the Prospect Park Picnic House.

I Love the Picnic House at Prospect Park, the view is amazing and the journey there is just magical. Especially in the fall. I was envious of all the guests swishing through the leaves in their best. Going down the pathway and entering a little, hidden building to celebrate a marriage.

The Picnic house reminds me of a warm, lively version of the Ice Palace in Dr. Zhivago, or the Petit Trianon what the houses might have been during happier times.

The day was perfect and I found this little dove sitting in a witch hazel tree. What a wonderful day for a wedding!

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Lavender is wonderful, the smell reminds me of summer sunshine and a warm blanket all in one. It is a great flavor to take into the colder months and has become the new hot item at Cookshop. Marcello Butron, a “barchef” at the hot eatery near the Highline shared his recipe for Lavender Cosmopolitans that he makes with our home-grown lavender.

LAVENDER COSMOPOLITAN

by: Marcello Butron

To Make Lavender Vodka

Infuse one bottle of vodka with a bunch of lavender for 1-2 days (he uses lavender from Rose Red & Lavender  which is organically grown)

Mix the lavender vodka with a fresh bottle of vodka at a 1:1 ratio.

To Make the Cosmopolitan

2 1/2 oz of Lavender Vodka

1 1/2 oz of white cranberry juice

1/2 oz of simple syrup (1pt sugar dissolved in 1pt water)

1/2 oz of fresh lemon juice

Mix together in a shaker over cracked ice. Strain and serve up in a Martini glass with a lemon twist.

Enjoy!

Now for some flowers

Book your holiday flowers Now to pickup or be delivered on Thanksgiving Week.

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