Mindful Blooms farm
When’s the last time you bought flowers? Do you know where they were grown? Do you know if they were sprayed with chemicals while they were grown or before they were brought to you?
Sophia Watson, owner of Mindful Blooms Farm, knows a lot about the traditional U.S. flower market. Often, she says, flowers are grown overseas and sprayed with chemicals several times. Getting them from the field to the buyer burns up fuel and often creates a lot of transportation waste.
Watson, on the other hand, is mindful about the way she grows her local flowers.
Originally from Bradenton, she had a corporate gig in Philadelphia for a couple of years before she apprenticing at farms in Asheville, NC, and Gainesville, FL. It was on those farms where she fell in love with growing flowers.
“I saw their value and learned about the beauty, joy, hope, and creativity that they bring,” Watson says.
Watson, who studied social entrepreneurship at Rollins College in Winter Park, always knew she wanted to start her own business and do something with a positive environmental impact. When her mom moved to a farm in Myakka City, she knew the timing was right to start her local flower-growing business. Mindful Blooms, well, bloomed two years ago.
Watson focuses on regenerative farming, meaning that she farms in ways that create or add to life in the soil. She plants cover crops in the off-season to send nutrients to the soil. She doesn’t use any pesticides, instead focusing on biodiversity in her plantings so pests don’t wipe out an entire crop at once.
“I try and keep things a little more wild and natural,” she says.
Watson grows flowers for Mindful Blooms on just a quarter of an acre. She plants a variety of annuals depending on the time of year, ranging from sunflowers and marigolds to snapdragons, Queen Anne’s lace, forget-me-nots, and more. Her growing season runs from October to June.
Mindful Blooms is a vendor at both the Bradenton Farmers Market on Saturdays and the Farmers’ Market at Lakewood Ranch when her flowers are in season. She also hosts events like U-pick and workshops like Intentional Seeding—the latter of which includes a meditation in the flower fields and tips for seeding flowers—as well as farm yoga held twice a month by a yoga instructor.
“I’m into healing, disconnecting from the world, and reconnecting with nature and using flowers, beauty, and art,” she says.
Mindful Blooms also provides flowers for weddings.
Watson loves the reaction she gets from clients who see her flowers. “Their breath is taken away by the colors. It’s so different than what they get at a grocery store,” she says. “My flowers are such a mix of colors and textures, and they have a beautiful, natural look.”
