Very good tutorial from a professional garden...
I have subscribed to access all the courses so have watched one on interior design and this one with Butter Wakefield who specialises in small garden design. She ...
Louise Brown
Apr 10, 2026
Cut and Come Again Masterclass
Supporting a dahlia with a hazel nest
with SARAH RAVEN — Acclaimed English gardener, cook and writer. Host of the UK’s No.1 gardening podcast.
Lesson 33 of 48
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Some dahlia varieties can grow tall with heavy flower heads, but luckily there are sustainable ways to support them. In this lesson, you’ll learn how to weave your very own hazel nest.
From the Lesson Workbook
Supporting a Dahlia with a Hazel Nest
One of our favourite dahlias is 'Waltzing Matilda' which grows to around 90 cm in height. Like many of our cut flowers, if we want to produce straight stems then we need to give the plants some support.
For this particular dahlia we are going to create a nest using leftover hazel twigs.
To Create Your Nest:
- push your hazel twigs into the ground around your plant, but not too close to it
- create a fan effect all around your plant, encircling it with hazel
- bend the hazel fronds together and tie them together over the dahlia
- secure any loose ends to the frame with twine
- this will give the dahlia support as it grows outwards and upwards.
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Your Instructor
Sarah Raven
Acclaimed English gardener, cook and writer. Host of the UK’s No.1 gardening podcast.
Sarah Raven is a renowned English gardener, cook and award-winning author. She is an inspirational and passionate teacher - combining her decades of experience with her scientific approach to growing (she is medically trained) - and has been running cooking, flower arranging and gardening courses at Perch Hill, her 90-acre farm in East Sussex, and around the UK for over 30 years. She has written for a host of major publications - including House & Garden, The Saturday Telegraph, Country Living, Gardens Illustrated, Gardeners’ World Magazine and The English Garden - and presented on TV shows including Gardeners' World and BBC’s Great British Garden Revival. Her gardening and cookery books have won numerous awards including ‘Best Specialist Gardening Book’ for The Cutting Garden and ‘Cookery Book of the Year’ for Sarah Raven's Garden Cookbook. Sarah is married to the writer Adam Nicolson, Vita Sackville-West's grandson. She also has an online shop that is a brilliant destination for plants, bulbs, seeds, tools and all things garden.
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