A Passion for Purple

Although the weather outside is still cold and frosty,  the later winter and spring flowers are defiantly blossoming in all their glory.  Purple seems to be the color of choice at the moment around Violet Hill Farm - most appropriately of course, given the farms namesake!

My all time favorite flower - the sweet violet (Viola odorata) is forming a profuse carpet of bright green and purple in the shady bed under the elderberry trees.  It has taken me quite some time to get a full carpet, but it was worth the wait as it has become the perfect spot for these tiny late winter and early spring jewels.

The Australian climber Hardenbergia is a cloud of starry purple pin-pricks - it's almost over-whelming...

...and the rosemary is making it's contribution to keeping the bees fed over winter with it's pale violet flowers.

But, still - there is no beating the beauty and scent of the wee sweet violet.  Diane Ackerman has written a beautiful book on scent and her description of the scent of violets is delightful "Violets smell like burnt sugar cubes that have been dipped in lemon and velvet".  She also explains why the scent of violets is so difficult for perfumers to capture; "Violets contain ion one, which short-circuits our sense of smell.  The flower continues to exude its fragrance, but we lose the ability to smell it.  Wait a minute or two, and the smell will blare again.  Then it will fade again, and so on."  - but despite it's flirtation with our senses it evokes such memories (in my case of visits to Mrs Hart's magical garden where I always went home from my fortnightly visits with a bundle of seasonal flowers, a few bantam eggs a tummy full of lemonade and dreams of secret gardens and the beauty and delight of plants), as Helen Keller wrote "Smell is a potent wizard that transports us across thousands of miles and all the years we have lived."  My garden is full of plants that evoke particular memories and I love the depth of sensory experience that provides as I wander the garden.  

I have a lovely old book of English wildflowers which contains a gorgeous description and illustration of the violet and I still adore the Shakespeare quote from Midsummer Night's Dream "I know a bank whereon the wild thyme grows.  Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows".  

Now, the only problem is that one bed of violets is never enough - so the hunt is on for another secret shady spot to expand the territory of this purple sensation!