ABOUT sunspell
Rooted in the rhythms of New England seasons
About Sunspell Flora
Sunspell Flora is a small flower farm based in Essex County, Massachusetts, growing seasonal flowers rooted in the rhythms of New England.
We grow flowers for CSA subscriptions, florist wholesale, seasonal bouquet offerings, and dahlia tuber sales, focusing on unusual varieties, ecological growing practices, and flowers that reflect the season they were grown in.
Rather than importing flowers year-round, we work within the natural pace of the growing season. From the first tulips of early spring through the abundance of midsummer and into late-season dahlias and seedpods.
about lauren
I started Sunspell Flora in 2021 after spending years working as a farm hand and horticultural assistant in North Carolina.
I was young when I started the farm, but I knew farming was the kind of work that would bring me joy and challenge me in equal measure.
A lot of my life revolves around being outside and paying attention to the small shifts that happen through the season - watching fields change week to week, trialing new crops, solving problems as they come up, and trying to balance the hundred different moving parts that come with farming.
I love the physicality of the work, the constant problem-solving, and the feeling that no two seasons are ever exactly the same.
I also love birds, rainy days on the farm, and bringing my dog to work.
WHY FLOWERS?
Flowers are fleeting, seasonal, and deeply tied to place.
That’s part of what makes them meaningful.
Many of the flowers we grow are varieties that don’t ship well, don’t last weeks in storage, or simply aren’t practical in industrial floral systems.
Growing locally allows those flowers to exist the way they were meant to. Harvested fresh, grown in season, and connected to the landscape they came from.
We believe flowers should feel alive, imperfect, and reflective of the season outside.
ABOUT THE FARM
Sunspell Flora grows on leased land across the North Shore of Massachusetts, with production focused around seasonal field growing and overwintered high tunnel crops.
Our growing season shifts constantly depending on weather, rainfall, temperature swings, pests, timing, and the unpredictability that comes with farming in New England.
We spend a lot of time experimenting. Trialing new flower varieties, testing overwintering methods, comparing field versus tunnel production, and learning what actually performs well in our climate and growing conditions.
Some experiments are wildly successful.
Others? Get eaten by voles.
That’s farming.
GROWING PHILOSOPHY
We grow flowers using ecological growing practices with an emphasis on seasonality, soil health, biodiversity, and local production.
Rather than forcing flowers outside their natural season, we prefer to work with the changing pace of the year, allowing spring flowers to feel like spring flowers, and late summer flowers to arrive in their own time.
A bouquet in April should not look the same as a bouquet in August.
We believe flowers feel more meaningful when they remain connected to the place and season they came from.
WHAT WE GROW
The farm focuses on seasonal specialty cut flowers, including tulips, snapdragons, sweet peas, lisianthus, campanula, grasses, dahlias, and other textural blooms grown throughout the season.
Flower availability changes constantly depending on weather and bloom timing, which means no two weeks on the farm ever really look the same.
WHERE THE FLOWERS GO
Flowers grown on the farm are shared through:
At this time, Sunspell Flora does not offer full-service wedding or event florals.
From the Farm
Much of the farm’s trialing, growing experiments, seasonal observations, successes, failures, and behind-the-scenes work can be found in the Field Notes journal.
Flower farming changes quickly with the season, and the journal exists as a way to document and share some of that process along the way.
