Love of flowers sparks latest collab on cards and complementary products
Bonding over a love of flowers has led to Lola Design’s latest collaboration with pick-your-own phenomenon Dahlia Beach and its founder Andie McDowell.
Exactly a year on from that first meeting, the new collection of greeting cards, gardener’s notebook organiser, stationery, soap and wallpaper is being launched at Spring Fair.
“We first met Andie at Spring Fair last year,” explained Lola’s co-founder Amanda Mountain. “As a keen allotment enthusiast and dahlia lover who already followed her on Instagram, I was thrilled to spot her there and couldn’t wait to chat about dahlias.
“We hit it off immediately and, later in the year, Andie reached out about collaborating – it’s a perfect fit, and we’d already thought the same when we first met! Dahlia Beach celebrates the beauty of flowers, just like us, making it a match made in floral heaven.”
It was thanks to Covid that the former TV director turned wedding videographer went into gardening for a living after her Cotswolds-based video company went bust due to the pandemic.
Focusing on her garden was a positive so she set herself the challenge of creating a new flowerbed from scratch, deciding to concentrate on a selection of dahlias and annuals she’d grown herself ready to open for the National Gardens Scheme.
Andie then launched a website selling dahlia tubers from a leading supplier in Holland and the success persuaded her to launch a pick-your-own flower farm on an acre leased at Millets Farm in Oxfordshire, where she also runs workshops in how to grow and arrange the perennial plants, in front of Poggy, the company’s bright pink open top dahlia-decker bus.
“This collaboration brings together the best of Dahlia Beach and Lola Design. Each item in the collection reflects our love for flowers and craftsmanship. We’re thrilled to offer products that add beauty and quality to everyday life,” Andie said.
After Andie shared her favourite dahlias, Amanda got to work creating the designs which were then refined, starting with a wallpaper repeat and expanding into the complementary products.
Amanda added: “It’s been an absolute joy to bring our shared love of flowers to life through this beautiful collaboration. It’s allowed us to bring the beauty of British-grown dahlias into a collection that’s unique and functional. From the luxurious greeting cards to the gardener’s soap, each piece celebrates nature in a thoughtful way.”
The 12-design card collection and other items can be seen on the Lola Design stand 3S24 at Spring Fair, which runs at Birmingham’s NEC from Sunday to Wednesday, 2-5 February.
