First Year Cut Flower Garden Tour
Welcome to our first year cut flower garden tour – filled with dahlias, zinnias and other flower blooms, plus the story behind our local flower collective.
I’m so excited you’re here because this little corner of our yard has quickly become one of my favorite projects ever.
If you’ve been following along for a while, you probably remember our carriage house and Airbnb build. When that project was finally complete, we were left with something we hadn’t planned for—a giant mound of dirt where the excavation had taken place.
Instead of seeing a muddy mess filled with weeds, we saw an opportunity.
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What if we turned it into a place that could grow beauty, feed our family, and bring joy to our community? That’s exactly what we set out to do!
More Gardening Posts
- Four Steps to Planning and Building a Cut Flower Garden
- What We Planted in Our Cut Flower Garden
- Our First Year Cut Flower Garden Tour
- Our Pay What You Can Flower Stand
Be sure to check out my Cut Flower Garden Supplies and Flower Stand Essentials on Amazon with these affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Homemade Heather!
Why We Built a Cut Flower Garden
Our cut flower garden started with one simple goal: transform an unused part of our backyard into something beautiful.
As I began dreaming about the space, the vision kept growing. I didn’t just want flowers—I wanted bouquets to share, inspired by my friend Lisa who loves to give bouquets of fresh cut flowers to anyone in need!
We also wanted vegetables for our kitchen. Fresh herbs, fruit and a space that could produce and invited us outside every single day.
That dream eventually became a reality where we have begun to share the abundance from our garden in the form of market bouquets and produce. We’ve started to stock our Flower Stand with these things and ofter them on a free or pay what you can basis – the response from the community has been amazing!
Read more out the whole project in my Flower Stand post.
The Final Piece of Our Backyard Transformation
After several years spent building our carriage house, hosting Airbnb guests and renovating our Airstream (that’s a whole other story!), the backyard still needed some attention.
Our cut flower garden became the final piece of the puzzle.
Today, what was once a muddy pile of dirt has become a thriving backyard garden filled with colorful blooms, vegetables, herbs and fruit. It’s amazing what a little vision—and a lot of hard work—can accomplish.
How Big Is Our Garden?
Our backyard garden is approximately 325 square feet and includes nine newly built raised beds.
Five of those raised beds are dedicated entirely to cut flowers. The remaining beds are home to vegetables, herbs, strawberries, grapes, raspberries and other garden favorites that we love cooking with throughout the summer.
We also transformed our front perennial garden into nearly 400 square feet of cut flowers and bouquet fillers, giving us blooms from the front yard to the back. That’s a total of about 725 sq ft of garden space.
A Tour of Our Backyard
The back garden is where most of our production flowers live.
You’ll find two raised beds of dahlias, two raised beds of zinnias, one bed of cosmos, a snapdragon patch and a spot for celosia. All growing alongside tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, pumpkins, squash and herbs.
Along the fences, grapes are just getting established while raspberries and cheerful sunflowers create a colorful backdrop.
The Front Garden
Out front, we’ve planted a beautiful mixture of dahlias, scabiosa, strawflower, statice, feverfew, Bells of Ireland and other cottage garden favorites that make wonderful bouquet fillers.
Every corner has something blooming—or getting ready to bloom.
What’s Growing Here?
Although this is our very first year growing a dedicated cut flower garden, we’ve packed it full of flowers we hope will keep blooming from spring through fall.
Some of our favorites include:
- Dahlias
- Zinnias
- Cosmos
- Snapdragons
- Celosia
- Scabiosa
- Strawflower
- Statice
- Feverfew
- Bells of Ireland
- Sunflowers
Alongside the flowers we’re also growing tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, sugar snap peas, strawberries, pumpkins, squash, grapes, raspberries and plenty of fresh herbs.
The best part? Everything works together. Fresh vegetables for dinner, herbs for cooking (and bouquet fillers), and beautiful bouquets for friends and neighbors.
We companion planted green onions with the strawberries, cantelope with butternut squash, calendula with the tomatoes and marigolds with the cucumbers and zucchini.
What We Hope This Garden Becomes
I thought we were building a flower garden. Instead, we’ve found ourselves building something much bigger.
This garden has already introduced us to an incredible community of flower growers who generously shared dahlia tubers, gardening advice and encouragement. Those gifts inspired us to create our pay-what-you-can flower stand, where bouquets and extra produce are available for anyone who could use a little extra joy.
Our hope is that this garden continues to grow—not just in flowers, but in kindness.
Throughout this journey I’ll share everything we’ve learned about planning, building and growing our backyard cut flower garden, along with plenty of behind-the-scenes moments from our weekly harvests and flower stand.
I’m so glad you’re following along!
Frequently Asked Questions
Is this your first cut flower garden?
Yes! While both Martin and I have had flourishing gardens in the past, this is our first dedicated cut flower garden. We’re excited to share both our successes and the lessons we’re learning along the way.
Will you be sharing gardening tips?
Absolutely! We’ll be documenting everything from seed starting and raised bed construction to harvesting bouquets and overwintering dahlias.
Can people visit your flower stand?
Yes! During the growing season we stock our Fresh Cut Flower Stand with bouquets and extra garden produce whenever we’re in town. It’s a pay-what-you-can stand because we believe flowers are meant to be shared.
Be sure to check out the next post in our series – How To Create a Flower Stand. Remember to spread kindness like dandelion seeds—because the smallest act of generosity can bloom into something beautiful.
