Lovely Bunches offers a way to take a color palette home

Kara Krapfl loves gardening and cut flowers.

“I have flowers everywhere,” she said. “I especially love having them in the bathroom because I have three little kids who aren’t always tidy. And it just makes me happy to see flowers in the bathroom.”

Now Krapfl helps other people bring the joy of cut flowers into their own homes through Lovely Bunches, a pick-your-own flower farm she opened with her mother, Sharon Dooley.

The farm is located on their family’s property — where they have lived for decades — just outside Iowa City, along a popular biking route.

The two officially started the business last year.

“We just love living here and I was trying to think of a business that we could do to invite people out here to experience slower living,” recalled Krapfl, noting that opening their business during dealing with COVID-19 was a way to focus on the positive.

The pair has developed a great partnership in running the flower farm.

“My mom has an eye for arranging flowers and how the garden should go. She has lived out here for so long and leads the vision for how we want things laid out,” said Krapf.

She added they have taken great care to design the garden layout so it isn’t just rows of flowers. She is particularly fond of the trellis arches they have created to give the garden an adventurous spirit.

“I do the gardening research to make sure we take care of the flowers the best we can,” Krapfl said. “I look into soil amendments, all the science side of things which I love.

“I’m more of an environmentalist and we want to be environmentally friendly, so we plant mostly organic, open-pollinated and heirloom varieties. In addition to growing beautiful flowers for people to enjoy, we want to contribute to the ecosystem and help feed pollinators.”

Krapfl said a lot of research goes into natural ways to raise the flowers and making sure they are planting varieties that aren’t poisonous to cats, dogs, horses or other livestock.

“We want to make sure that when people come here they don’t have to worry about what they take home.”

Watching the flowers grow throughout the season is one of the most rewarding parts of Krapfl’s job, she said.

“I love watching the process of starting them from seeds and watching them grow into something beautiful. Flowers really do transform, and I get to be a spectator to that. It’s a lovely metamorphosis.”

This year they planted some 20 varieties including peonies, milk thistle, zinnias, calendula, dahlia, cosmos, celosia, strawflowers, borage, status, gladiolus, forget-me-nots, rudbeckia, scabiosa, butterfly bush, butterfly weed, sweet Annie, hollyhocks, black-eyed Susan, daisies and nasturtium.

“Another thing I love about flowers is that we get three different seasons with them — spring, summer, and fall,” Krapfl said.

But there are plenty of weeds to pull.

”We basically start at one end, work our way to the other and then start again when we are done,” Krapfl said.

“That's the fun of it. We learn and can do something different every year.”

While the flower farm is open for picking on the weekend — 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays — customers can call for appointments. She noted this was very popular this past summer during the height of the pandemic.

“Sometimes I’ll just post on social media saying it’s going to be a really nice day and we’ll be out picking so come on out and pick,” she said.

Lovely Bunches charges by the bunch, not the stem.

“We give people a bucket when they come out to cut and tell them to just cram them all in there,” she explained.

“It’s more of a laid back approach because counting stems doesn’t sound like any fun at all to me.

“This is a place for people to use their creative side,” she added. “Maybe they have a color palette in mind or they just want to wander and see what they like.”

Know a business in the Corridor that just mighty make for a clever “My Biz” feature? Let us know by contacting michaelchevy.castranova@thegazaette.com.