May has proved to be a busy month for us here at Cotswold Remedies. For the second year running, we’ve had a stand at the RHS Malvern Spring Festival – a wonderful event which brings together spectacular gardens, gorgeous blooms and inspiring ideas for visitors to try at home. As well as selling our products, we gave away over 250 complimentary lip balms and hand balms and ran several workshops to share our love of hand-blended natural products. A highlight of the festival was giving a demonstration to a big group of children who had been involved in designing the school gardens at the show. This fantastically enthusiastic bunch couldn’t quite believe that it is possible to make your own balms using just two ingredients: beeswax and a carrier oil, such as olive oil, jojoba oil or almond oil. |
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Our commitment to creating products which are non-harmful to humans, animals and the planet, certainly fitted with the ethos of this year’s Malvern show. As well as running our stand, I spent time exploring everything the festival had to offer. As I came away brimming with ideas and inspiration, I thought I'd share some of my highlights with you. Having seen the Wildlife Trusts' prize-winning ‘Wilder Spaces’ show garden, I’m now keen to recreate elements of it at the end of my own garden. As well as being so serene, it showcased clever ways in which wildlife-friendly spaces can be incorporated into our gardens using building waste, reclaimed materials and untreated timbers. The forward-thinking team behind its creation incorporated features such as a partially submerged amphibian reed, a hoverfly stump lagoon, leaf-cutter bee towers and a biodiverse living roof. It really was a worthy gold medal winner and will have inspired many others to reimagine their own gardens with a greater focus on biodiversity. Even if you are just choosing to take part in the annual No Mow May – the talk of the festival, in many ways – you are doing your bit to encourage wildlife to flourish close to home. |
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The Wildlife Trusts: Wilder Spaces (Show Garden – Gold Award)
Designed by Jamie Langlands, Lead Designer at Oxford Garden Design |
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A trend I noticed at the show was a move towards simplicity in flower arranging. Florists were using foraged wildflowers, such as cow parsley, to great effect and I am now keen to have a go myself. As well as being lovely inside the home, they’d work a treat on an outdoor dining table too. There are masses of these pretty white flowers about at the moment and I love how they can be used to create relaxed, natural posies. Feeling immediately inspired to make an arrangement for our stand, my colleague Harriet created the pretty one shown below using cow parsley and other spring flowers. When it comes to floral displays, isn’t green and white such a fantastic pairing? |
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Looking after your mental health |
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This week is Mental Health Awareness Week (15th-21st May), and this year's theme is anxiety. Whether it’s just a walk through the park or getting my hands dirty in the garden, being outdoors can really help keep unwelcome feelings at bay. I also believe that certain essential oils can support our wellbeing. Geranium and orange are my two favourite ones for this, and I regularly diffuse this combination at home, or put them in a rollerball applicator so that I can use them when I’m out and about. If you’re finding life challenging at the moment and would like to learn more about anxiety, then take a look at the Mental Health Foundation’s website: Mental Health Awareness Week 2023 | Mental Health Foundation |
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I’ve been listening to: Food writer and cook, Mark Diacono. Whilst at the festival, I took the opportunity to listen to Mark Diacono speaking about fermenting. By the end of his talk I had bought into his no-nonsense guide to fermenting from scratch. It’s something I’ve been interested in for a long time due to the health benefits which come from eating fermented food. |
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It was fascinating to learn more about the gut-brain connection and, whilst it is a relatively new area of research, there’s increasing evidence that improving your gut microbiome could help to reduce the symptoms of conditions like anxiety and depression. Interestingly, whilst fermented foods aren’t a part of most western diets, they have been used in eastern cuisine for centuries. If you’d like to learn more, Mark's book, Ferment: slow down, make food to last, is a brilliant read. I’m planning to make my first batch of sauerkraut very soon! |
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I’ve been following: Dr. Mark Hyman on Instagram @drmarkhyman I currently enjoy following Dr. Hyman, a renowned leader in the field of functional medicine – his daily posts are both inspiring and informative. I often try out his recipes and llike the fact that most of them use minimal ingredients and can be made under 30 minutes. I would highly recommend the Orange Ginger Salmon en Papillote recipe. |
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Throughout June, we’re going to be popping up at The Curated Store in Stow-on-the-Wold. We'll will be launching a new range of natural body products there, so please do visit if you're in the area – it's a fabulous place to shop for handmade items! |
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Finally, as we approach our second anniversary, we promise to stay true to our original vision of creating natural products using high quality organic ingredients that don’t cost our customers the earth. Due to the world events of the past year, we have experienced a significant increase in costs across all areas of our business. Whilst we have tried wherever possible to offset these costs, it has not been possible to completely absorb them and we will be increasing the prices of some of our products from 1st June 2023. Never compromising on the quality of our ingredients, we will endeavour to find new ways to keep our prices as reasonable as possible so that you can continue to enjoy the benefits of our award-winning products. |
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I look forward to sharing my ideas, thoughts and exciting new product launches with you in June. |
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Cotswold Remedies, 58 Albert Road, Cheltenham GL52 2QX |
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