Trendhunting: chasing rainbows

Have you ever thought that flower growers need to be a year ahead of the trends?

That’s because we’re choosing varieties and buying seeds a year ahead of the season, so need to know what we want. Or, more specifically, we need to know what YOU want. Flowers take time to grow, and most of our main crops are in the ground already in May so we’re often selecting summer varieties in the heat of the year before.

I love this aspect of the job. It’s a throwback to my PR days in London where identifying trends was the mainstay of the job. We used to scour newspapers and clips for ‘newshijacking’ angles and offer client comment and perspectives on all sorts of fascinating subjects.

These days, I love floral trendhunting abroad, drawing inspiration from lots of British, European and Australian trends in flowers, trying to guess which ones will translate well here. Yes, there are big trends in flowers here, especially for weddings as any floral designer will tell you after the zillionth request for ‘burgundy/apricot combos’ or ‘greenery and white only’ please.

One of the biggest tools we use in CROP is the Pantone Colour of the Year. In 2022, it was ‘Very Peri’ (like a lilac), in 2023 it was Viva Magenta, and last year, we had  Apricot Crush. We planned accordingly with King Giant Apricot Asters, Iron Apricot Stock, Apricot Beauty Foxgloves, and Champagne Lisianthus, plus a number of new pale coloured dahlias. These colours are always popular with our florists, but we had a definite spike in request for ‘brights’ in the past two years (possibly as a kick back to the blandness of Covid…) so heading towards a more neutral and subtle palette will be a direction change for sure.

Watch this space.