Since opening our full service florist in historic downtown Bath in late October of 2010, we have had the opportunity to expand our offerings for weddings and all kinds of celebrations. Now open year round, we love that we can explore interesting new materials grown for the floral trade. Our design sense is natural, romantic and fresh. Our flowers uplift and feed your soul! With the flower farm at the heart of our business, our floral designs are expressions of the flowers, each unique.

Passionflower Farm delivers flowers locally. The towns of Bath, West Bath, Woolwich, Phippsburg, Georgetown, Arrowsic, Bailey Island, Harspwell, Cundy’s Harbor, Brunswick and Topsham are all within our delivery area. Call us for more details or join us on facebook for current news.

Seacoast Bride Magazine

The original Passionflower Farm will operate during the growing season providing chemical free flowers and plants for our customers. Our plan to become certified organic is underway. When need arises, we will locate materials from other flower farms in the area to fulfill requests, retaining our desire to provide local products. Additionally, we will work with local floral wholesalers to find the freshest and most interesting plant materials available on the East Coast.

We look forward to serving our customers year round at our new retail location. Plan a trip to beautiful historic downtown Bath. Autumnfest is occurring during Columbus Day week-end. Visit Main Street Bath for more details. This family festival will also mark the opening of our new store. See you there!

Recently, at the Friday Brunswick Farmer’s Market, I met the most delightful bride. She arrived with her maid of honor and daughter and was overjoyed to see I had hydrangeas. The next day she was to be married in Harpswell and still needed to secure her flowers. This is a rare bride indeed who can be so spontaneous. As it turned out, planning would have been more stressful for her. She was more comfortable letting things happen naturally. So when she saw that I had the flowers she had dreamed most of, she started there and arranged her bridal bouquet and the wedding party’s bouquets right there at the farmer’s market on my flower display table. It was a wonderful moment to behold. She walked away with her arms laden with bouquets, beaming as she passed through the vegetable vendors, making her way home.

More often, folks meet me at the farmer’s market or read the blog and plan a visit to the farm ahead of the wedding, say a few weeks. Sometimes it happens within a few days of the wedding. The experience of walking through the gardens and seeing all the possibilities that are in bloom at that moment in time, offers the combination of enjoying local flowers freshly harvested and made personal by custom selection. This works for d.i.y. or custom arrangements.

Those planning a wedding from out- of -state can check the blog for what is currently in bloom in a given month. Weddings planned in detail many months in advance will need to make slight adjustments depending on the growing season and other natural conditions which affect flowers bloom times. However, a good estimate of what is typically in bloom can be determined in advance.

So, if you are all about enjoying what is local in Maine, Passionflower Farm is all that!

Sometimes folks ask why bother getting organic certification for ornamental crops? If you believe in organic, you believe in it. Period. That’s why. To elaborate, to live on land that is safe for my family, pets, chickens, bees and everyone else around us. To protect the water supply. To improve the soil every year instead of applying endless fertilizer that washes away and ends up in our neighbors yard and water supply. To grow amazingly beautiful flowers. To raise happy and naturally healthy chickens and bees. To support life rather than destroy it. Those are just a few of the reasons.

There are encouraging signs that the organic movement is finally getting some wonderful press. That it’s finally becoming mainstream to eat organically, even recommended now by those authority figures who decide what is healthy for all of us. Sigh. It will only get better for all of us, the more people decide to support the organic farmers. So we are very excited about the future endorsement for our flowers and plants and bees and chickens and us.

Passionflower Farm is also excited about hosting the Bath Garden Club on July 27th. We are honored they have chosen to include our farm on their summer field trip tour. Summer is in full swing now. The new list of what is blooming here at Passionflower Farm in the first week of July filled several pages of my notebook. The new list is posted on the sidebar. Also, note that Passionflower Farm is now in Brunswick’s Farmer’s Market on Fridays only for the rest of the season. The Bath Farmer’s Market is on Saturdays only. Hope to see you there!

Start with fiddleheads and wild mushrooms from the forests, lobster and mussels from the sea and tender spring lettuces and asparagus from the gardens. Add a bouquet of lupine, peonies and iris, a bottle of local beer or wine and some good friends. Find a pretty view. It’s that easy.

Outdoor farmer’s markets are in full swing now. On any given day of the week one can be located anywhere in the state. M.O.F.G.A. has a listing of all the markets currently happening. Passionflower Farm is now selling seasonal fresh cut flowers, annual and perennials on Tuesdays and Fridays in Brunswick on the Mall. On Saturdays, Passionflower Farm is in Bath in the Waterfront Park. As of June 2nd, the farm is open for garden visits.

Enjoy!

Perennials
Aconitum henryi ‘Sparks Variety’ (Autumn Monkshood)Full-P/S, 3′, Dark Blue, Sept-Oct,Z4
Ajuga ‘Burgundy Glow’ (Bugleweed)Full-P/S, 6″,Violet Blue, May, Z4 (groundcover)
Alchemilla mollis (Lady’s mantle)Full-P/S, 18″, Chartreuse, May-June, Z4 (see-through edging, groundcover)
Campanula persicifolia ‘Alba’ & ‘Blue’ (Peachleaved Bellflower) Full-P/S, 30″, White/Blue, June-July, Z3
Centaurea ‘Montana’ (Mountain Bluets, Perennial Bachelor Button)Full-P/S, 1-2′, Blue, May-July, Z4
Echinops bannaticus (Globe Thistle)Full-P/S, 4-6′, Bluish Gray, June-August, Z3 (statuesque)
Hosta lancifolia (Narrow leaved Plantain Lily) P/S-Deep Shade, 18″, Violet, August, Z3 (edging)
Phlox ‘David’, Full-P/S, 3′, White, August-September, Z4, (mildew resistant)
Polemonium caeruleum (Jacob’s Ladder) P/S-Deep Shade, 2′, Blue, May, Z2
Pulmonaria saccharata ‘Mrs. Moon’ (Lungwort)P/S-Deep Shade, 10″, silver spotted leaves, Pink-Blue, April-May, Z3 (groundcover)
*first to bloom, not yet available for sale, Mid June
Rudbeckia fulgida sullvantii ‘Goldsturm’ (Black-eyed Susan)Full, 30-40″, Golden Yellow, July-October, Z4
Stachys byzantina (Lamb’s Ear)Full-P/S, 18″, Silver Woolly Foilage, Pink, May-June, Z4
Violets, Sweet, P/S-Deep Shade, 8″, Violet/White, April-May, Z5 (Fragrant)

Annuals (herbs, vegetables)
Basil, ‘Genovese’
Oregano
Sunberry, historic variety, sweet like blueberries
Ornamentals
Cleome ‘Violet Queen’ & ‘White Queen’
Cosmos ‘Bright Light’
Honeywort ‘Kiwi’
Hyacinth Bean ‘Ruby’
Nasturium ‘Alaska’
Zinnias ‘Benary Giant’, ‘Cactus’, ‘Oklahoma’
 

There will also be planted containers available for purchase at the Farm.

Each season has slight variations but generally the same trends with snow, rain and frosts have remained within a certain norm. This March and April have been the strangest I can recall. When there was an early warming in March, I assumed it was a fluke and we would soon return to frozen ground and piles of snow. When plants starting greening up early and then budding, I thought this can’t be happening. I waited to uncover the gardens for fear a killing frost would come any day. I waited to plant seed indoors to not get too far ahead of the so-called growing season. I waited to do anything I considered too risky outdoors and focused on traditionally safe chores. As the days passed, I finally gave in to the freakish optimism that the gardens were exhibiting and joined them. I accelerated my seed planting schedule and went about the garden chores like it was the month of May because in the garden world, it looks by every visual clue to be the month of May. Atleast the month of May which I was once familiar with in Maine. This year May might look like June or even July. Who knows this year. Anything is possible.

It seems like we might be moving in the direction of new growing zones. The United States Department of Agriculture periodically adjusts the growing zones to reflect new data. This one spring does not make a trend. However, with so many other variables happening all over the country it will be interesting to see what happens with all these subtle and not so subtle shifts. If any more evidence for global warming was needed to convince anyone out there, seems like it’s pretty clear that OUR CLIMATE IS CHANGING! So even though I am happy to have a longer potential growing season and perhaps a more mild one too, I can’t help but feel the price is too high if this is a precursor to a warmer planet. So if it wasn’t already a good idea to grow plants and do it organically, now is definitely the time.

I’m looking forward to providing the local community with annual seedlings which are presently bursting out of the greenhouse space and overflowing into our living room. Today, I have begun the process of digging and potting up perennials which will also be available at the Farmer’s Markets and our home Farm Stand. There are spring bulbs blooming with the Forsythia right now. In May, there will be some interesting flowers to bring to the early markets. By late May, bouquets will be available. Starting in June, the farm will open on Wednesdays for visiting the display gardens and picking up plants and bouquets.

Although both the Bath and Brunswick Farmer’s Markets open May 1st and May 4th respectively, Passionflower Farm’s first day attending the markets will be May 14th. That is just around the corner. This is a busy and exciting time around here. Everything is turning a lush green in the gardens. The time all of us gardeners and farmers anticipate is now here!

Brunswick’s Farmer’s Market is open May 1st through October from 8:00 a.m. -2:00 p.m. on Tuesdays and Fridays. During July and August, Passionflower Farm will be there only on Tuesdays.

Bath’s Farmer’s Market is held on Saturdays in the Waterfront Park from 8:30 a.m. -12 noon.

See you there!