Bridgetown farm florist follows her nose, with homegrown ‘fragrant’ flowers for all

Walking into Earth Blooms Bridgetown, the gentle calming scent of natural blooms fills the air. Surrounded by seasonal flowers — a palette of pastels and lilac, a pop of hot pink and butter yellow, with a coral backdrop of plants outside — Earth Blooms floral shed is nestled in the rolling hills close to town. The floral business came to bloom when the time was right for farm florist and owner, Linda Maxfield. She told the Times her first job was in a florist straight out of her high school in the Kalamunda hills — but she never imagined running a farm florist later in life in Bridgetown. After working in other spaces for some time, Ms Maxfield said she returned to florals, but found it “boring” as the industry changed to focus on imported florals devoid of scent. With a passion for fragrant flowers grown organically, Ms Maxfield began to lose faith in the industry. “There was no fragrance in any of the flowers,” she said. “There was no seasonality, and it just didn’t appeal to me anymore — and I just went off it.” But, while working as an aroma therapist, she moved to Bridgetown with her husband and two daughters. That was 15 years ago, and another twist of fate saw her return to florals. While still running her business, Ms Maxfield became sick, and was unable to return to work for some time. “I was getting quite depressed, so I did quite a lot of soul searching,” she told the Times. Living in a beautiful 100-year-old house on a 0.6 hectare (1.5 acre) garden, all Ms Maxfield said she could think about was playing in the garden. “I was missing the flowers, I was missing floristry, I was really missing the creativity,” she said. Coming up with the idea to focus of growing flowers at home in the open — so the bees and butterflies could also enjoy them — her florist shop brought fragrance back to her life. “Everybody wanted local flowers. Everyone wanted fragrant flowers. They wanted garden flowers,” Ms Maxfield said. “I started planting the first few flowers, and I launched the little flower business — that would have been eight years ago. “So, here we are, and every year it just gets bigger, and I plant more, and I’ve got some little helpers in the garden now, which is fabulous. “I’m getting back to a full floristry service, which is like what I used to do 20 years ago.” Through workshops, she also now teaches others how to grow and arrange flowers to support a local network of growers in the South West.