Be Your Own Florist Mini-Series: Conditioning cut flowers for ultimate vase life

Welcome to our latest mini-series: Be your own florist - pick and arrange your own garden flowers, with Sarah Raven. Focused on the joys of floristry, Sarah will take you through the essential steps to bring the best of your garden to life in a vase.

This first episode is a fantastic crash course in conditioning your cut flowers, following Sarah’s 5 S’s for giving plants the most impressive vase life possible, with guidance on the vital steps like searing stem ends, sterilising bulbs, and where to pick your flowers from.

Products mentioned:

Dahlia ‘Penhill Watermelon’
Dahlia ‘Molly Raven’
Dahlia ‘Night Silence’
Lilium speciosum var. rubrum 'Uchida'
Hydrangea arborescens 'Incrediball' (Strong Annabelle)

[susanwondergem]

Most comprehensive conditioning video ever. Love the 5 s system and your hands on demonstration! Thank you so much.

[sunitashastry]

Such a very useful and beautiful video. Thank you!

[calliedawes]

Fantastic as always Sarah - super useful 😊

[Tsa]

I love your podcasts and this video. Good tips! Thank you.

[dianebrown]

Great video, thanks for sharing Sarah very useful info. Look forward to the next video

[JohanGalleberg]

I never understood, searing until you mentioned that it kills bacteria. Tried it and the water in my vase looks so much cleaner. do you cut again after searing? Do you sear twice then?

[fennecfox]

This video is just what I need!
Does anyone know how to condition Penstemons? I cut the stem on a diagonal, sear for 20 seconds and STILL only get three days max out of them before they shrivel and die.

[bethciaccio]

Wondered if you'd tested the submersion trick on dahlias? I have issues with finding earwigs in my dahlias and it's really put me off picking them 😕

[lienam]

Thank you for the tips. May I ask what do you do when you are making an arrangement- when shortening the stem, do you sear them the second time? Especially with the tricky ones like cerinthe major or hellebores? Thank you

[oanaharrison]

That was brilliant and very informative! I love watching your videos and am very much looking forward to the next one. Thank you!

[bewoodford]

Brilliant ttorial. Thank you. Happy gardening 🙂

[rosebutchers]

How do you condition Camellia - when I pick them they only last a day before the head drops off!! Maybe they are not suitable for picking.