You know when you are looking for one thing and you find something else quite different yet exactly what you should have been looking for? Well, there I was wandering around an online craft show hunting for some vintage sewing haberdashery (as I do) when I came across this seed packet for sweet peas.
I love sweets peas and always grow them but what caught my eye on this packet was the address. Nottingham is my home town and whilst I could not identify Perth Street from memory I knew exactly where Glasshouse Street was. So I bought it, an empty packet of sweet pea seeds, who knew that would become a thing! I googled for the company and did find a mention of a shop on Market Street in Nottingham and also photo of the shop on the Nottingham Evening Post website. The shop appears to be where Debenhams currently is which made me remember all those Friday afternoon I used to go with my mum to Griffin and Spaldings (the shop that was on this site before Debenhams) where she used to go for a shampoo and set. Funny isn't how one memory leads into another and another. It took many years before we stopped calling it Griffins (but then I still shop at Jessops and that became John Lewis in Nottingham so many years ago........).
I looked at online maps to see where Perth Street was. I was pleased that once identified I could picture it in my mind clearly. It has obviously changed quite a bit from whenever this packet was printed. It is a shame that whilst the packet says it is six named varieties it does not list the names as I would like to grow them.
Now I am going to do a bit of online hunting to see if I can identify the sweetpeas on the packet. If I can find ones looking close enough I shall grow a little patch of Nottingham sweetpeas.
