About this bunch
Twelve tall stems of Triticum aestivum at 45 to 60cm, hand-cut and barn-dried at Salle Moor Hall. These are bearded ears, so the awns are still on and the ear is full, which is what gives wheat its texture rather than just its colour. The gold is the colour ripe wheat actually is, undyed and unbleached.
It is the quietly useful bunch in the range. The stems are stiff enough to hold their own shape without support, which makes wheat one of the few dried things that will stand alone in a stoneware jug and look deliberate. It binds easily onto a wreath form, ties into a traditional sheaf, and works as textural filler in a mixed bouquet where everything else is soft.
Three things to know. The stems are brittle straight out of the box, so unpack gently and let them settle before you arrange them. Wheat pulls moisture back out of a humid room, so keep it away from bathrooms and steamy kitchens or it will go limp. And store it between uses in a paper bag or a box rather than sealed plastic, which traps damp against the stems. Kept dry and out of direct sun, the colour and shape hold for a year and well beyond.