Depending where you are in the country, daffodils are either in full bloom or at least showing promise. Daffodils have been grown around Kempley, just south of Ledbury, for decades and provided local children with the job of cutting & bunching with raffia the blooms before they were sent, by train, to market in London. For several years the village has celebrated this heritage with a Daffodil Weekend, this year coinciding with Mothering Sunday – 17th & 18th March 2012. The weekend offers an eight mile circular walk through fields and woodlands of wild daffodils (Joncils) – the shorter and less “blousey” native daffodil. This year, the villagers mark 100 years of The Arts and Crafts Movement with an exhibition inspired by the movement and held in the extraordinary Arts and Crafts church of St. Edward’s. The church was built in 1903 by local artisans and with some very distinctive features being described by John Betjeman as a “mini-cathedral of the Arts and Crafts movement”. Refreshments in the village hall are a lovely way to round-off this spring excursion.
