Flower plantation: making the bouquets

After visiting the flower plantation, we went to have a glance at the massive garage they use to make the bouquets ready to export abroad.

The process, briefly:
The flowers are cut from the plantation and put carefully in fabric beds as we can see below. Then, they are sent to fumigation, in order to kill insects that could destroy them later. Afterwards, women take flowers one by one and send them to the right bouquets. All the bouquets are put in boxes and sent to the fridge (2 to 4 degrees) for about 2 to 5 hours before being exported by plane.

Thanks very much Lucy for the visit! It’s always interesting to know where our supermaket’s products come from.

Flower plantation

Did you know that Colombia was the second largest flower exporting country in the world? I didn’t.

Last week, I was very lucky because my English friend Lucy took me to one of the places where she works: a flower plantation close to Tenjo.

Very inspiring for textures and colours.

This plantation is only making carnations and roses and some of them are sold in supermarkets like Sainsbury’s, Tesco, or Waitrose in the UK.

Colombian Jewels in Spitafield Market

My dear Londoners,
If you go this Sunday 28th of April to Spitafield Market, you will find Marcia who is selling the work of Andrea Cruz, Colombian Jewellery Designer from Cali. (Older post of mine in there).

If you want to know more about it, contact or follow Marcia on her blog
or twitter: @marciasquirrel.

Patterns of Colombia: colours

Another pattern made for the mysterious product.

Patterns of Colombia: mochilas de los Arhuacos

This bag is from the Arhuaco Tribe of the Sierra Nevada, Colombia. Patterns are very simple but at the same time very nice. They are obvioulsy handmade by the women of the region.

You can buy this kinf of bags in there in you are interested.

Orquideas in Tabio

In Tabio, walking down the streets, we discovered an exhibition of orquideas. It happened that the person who has a dessert’s shop also have a collection of Orquideas in the backyard. Better than in the Botanical Garden… Those guys are geeks of Orquideas for somehting like 12 years and we were completely amazed!

Wow, wow and wow!

I did the cat eyes to Mario to get one but…

The place is called Cuchipanda and is run by Zoraida Granados and Alvaro Arjona. Email them or call them: (0057) 311 265 9646.

Tabio

Tabio is another village we visited last weekend. Nice little church close to the mountain. Nice to meet Don Quijote de la Mancha along the way, he’s quite a nice guy!

Tenjo

We went to visit Tenjo this weekend. A village at about 1h30 from Bogotá by car.
It was Sunday and a market was taking place in the center of the village. People were playing games like tejo, trompo and many more typical games from Colombia. Very nice atmosphere.

And look at those colours…

In the market, I bought Yacón’s tea (In French, Yacón is “Poire de terre”, otherwise, it is called “Smallanthus sonchifolius”), which has apparently lots of virtues. And the root alone is good!

Chess and flowers

I was just playing with the new camera to discover that I have to learn everything about it… Sniff! I hate my pictures!

I am getting better at bargaining flowers: 5000 pesos (2.5 Euros / 1.8 Pound) for this. Maybe in one year I will be the best!

Anolaima

For the mysterious product that will come out very soon, we went to a beautiful farm in Anolaima, at something like 2 hours from Bogotá. They have all sorts of animals but also coffee plantations. They also have a school.

It’s called “La Granja de Ildefonso.”

I am finally godmother! Welcome to Daphné! That’s when I think it’s sad that I am so far away…