You’ll find Bloomstead set up Saturday mornings at the corner of Shuniah St. and Huron Ave. in Thunder Bay from 8am til Noon. Yes, it’s Labour Day weekend, but what better way to celebrate summer fading into fall than with fresh local flowers.

Our micro flower farm is located just a couple blocks away from the Bloom Bar location. Everything is grown right here in the city. We do our best to eliminate or at worst drastically reduce our plastic use, we don’t use pesticides, herbicides, or fungicides.

So many here in Thunder Bay are surprised when they see us growing flowers well into September. Our goal each year is to grow right through to Thanksgiving. We had this brilliant idea to offer flower arrangements in specialty pumpkins we grew, but… Well, we had massive crop failure and not one pumpkin. *womp womp* There’s always next year.

Do not fear these cooler nights. We are prepared with row covers, low tunnels, and a heated greenhouse. Let’s instead, make the absolute most we can out of these last fleeting weeks of bloom season.

What You’ll Find At The Bloom Bar Labour Day Weekend!

This weekend, we’ve harvested lots of great blooms for you to enjoy. Choose from a favourite palette, or pick your favourite bloom at the bar and build your bouquet around it!

This week we have:

Dahlias

Bells of Ireland

Celosia

Zinnias (GIANT zinnias)

Sunflowers

Feverfew

Aromatic Basil

Nigella seed pods

African marigolds in yellow, cream and orange

Amaranthe (if you’re into being a touch dramatic this weekend)

Gladiolus

Snapdragons

Pearly Everlasting

Scabiosa

Fall Colour Palettes Are Here

Make your pumpkin spice whatever whatever more Insta-worthy with some beautiful local blooms in great oranges, moody reds, creams, and golden yellows. Watch for the sunflowers, celosia, and dahlias to really bring out the fall vibes.

We have a variety of sunflowers this year traditional orange, lemon yellow, plum and orange, or white blooms. Pair a sunflower with a stunning orange, yellow, or white dahlia. Add some aromatic basil, the purple foliage really highlights these fall colours and the smell is amazing. Grab some african marigolds as accents (these are strongly scented, so make sure you care for the scent), with maybe some nigella pods for interest. Add some pearly everlasting for a fun punch of white.

Pastels Are Strong This Week

We chose dahlias in two colour palettes – fall and pastels. Last week the fall colours were more abundant in the dahlia crop — this week there’s a lot of pinky purple pastels. These look so good paired with the white feverfew, the contrasting scabiosa, and the feather-like celosia.

A Hard Year For Dahlias

This has been a very difficult growing year across Canada, and Northwestern Ontario was not exempt. We had a very loooong cold and dry spring delaying all the things (remember those single-digit night time temps ran right through to Canada Day). Sunflowers that should have bloomed mid-July bloomed two to three weeks later than expected.

We lost whole crops to the lack of rain and had to start seeds all over again creating further delays. Our pumpkins were frozen in time until August and there’s just not enough time left for them to catch up.

On top of that, what seemed like weeks of forest fire smoke dulled the sun and dropped particulate on the plants. Plants need the sun and clean leaves to photosynthesize, so many just stayed frozen in place waiting for better weather. So a very cold and dry June, a smokey and dry July…

But August has been almost perfect growing weather! Warm days and nights with good drenching weekly rain. Our dahlias soldiered through and bloomed right on time, as did many others. We did several successions of sunflowers, so even though those early seedlings were stunted, the later ones weren’t affected as much.

The dahlia crops across the country are struggling, but the micro climate here near Boulevard Lake saved our dahlias and we are thankful to have abundant blooms!

Stop by the Bloom Bar in Thunder Bay this Labour Day weekend for fresh, locally grown dahlias, sunflowers, zinnias and more—no pesticides, all local. Looking to rent the Bloom Bar for an event next summer? Reach out and send us a message.

Lisa & Jenna