(11 Jul 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
London, UK – 4 July 2025
++VIDEO QUALITY AS INCOMING ++
1. Various of lavender farm
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Lorna Maye, Owner, Mayfield Lavender Farm:
“As soon as the weather starts to warm up, that’s the time when you should be planting lavender because everything just goes crazy and it roots very quickly and then it establishes very quickly. But you know it’s a Mediterranean plant, it likes hot, dry, sunny conditions and so once you’ve planted it it just goes off and once you’ve watered it in, after you’ve watered it in and it’s established, you don’t need to do anything with it and that’s the beauty of it.”
3. Various of lavender farm
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Jess Maye, Shop Manager, Mayfield Lavender Farm:
“Lavender does loads of different things. It can be a great natural antiseptic and anti-inflammatory. So I use it a lot for sunburn, bee stings, mosquito bites. But, you know, it’s fantastic for helping you sleep, put a couple of drops on your pillow, put it in the bath to help you relax. It is mostly just for relaxing and sleeping but again as I mentioned a great natural antiseptic. So lots of multi purposes and it also just smells fantastic.”
5. Various of lavender farm
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Terry Gale, visitor:
“This is the first time we’ve been and it’s very impressive. It’s just so relaxing and obviously the lavender smells. It’s just a fantastic experience.”
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Wu Yifan, visitor:
“I’m from Taiwan. It’s a pretty place.”
8. Various of lavender farm
STORYLINE:
Here in the heart of Mayfield Lavender Farm in London, a woman dressed in white reclines in a large wooden heart to capture the ultimate Instagrammable moment.
Thousands of tourists from all over the world flock to this iconic twenty five acres of lavender fields, fifteen miles from the centre of the UK’s capital London, every year.
The site is a family-run business led by Lorna Maye and her husband.
According to Maye the fields once spread all the way down to Battersea in central London, and there were also lavender distilleries in Clapham.
However the industry died out due to major demand for housing which, along with a disease called “Shab”, killed off many of the plants in the 1880s and meant a lot of lavender growers came out of lavender farming and sold their land for residential development.
Thousands of acres which were once lavender fields gradually turned into housing estates and by the early 1900s most of the lavender in London had disappeared.
But in 2006 the Maye family brought it back, by starting the Mayfield Lavender Farm, which attracts thousands of visitors from all over the world every year.
According to Maye when they first opened in 2006 it was mostly people from the local area who visited. However, thanks to the power of social media, people now visit from all over the world.
Lavender is an amazing perennial plant which, according to Maye, doesn’t need a lot of water or maintenance to survive. The ideal time to plant it is spring, when the weather in the UK starts to get warmer.
“It’s a Mediterranean plant,” explains Maye.
“It likes hot, dry, sunny conditions and so once you’ve planted it it just goes off and once you’ve watered it in, after you’ve watered it in and it’s established, you don’t need to do anything with it and that’s the beauty of it.”
Lavender needs to be planted in well drained soil, so that the water will drain away if it’s raining a lot.
Wu Yifan has come all the way from Taiwan and says it’s a “pretty place”.
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