There is an unassuming little family farm in Red Hook, NY that single-handedly saved my flower-starved soul this week. Battenfeld’s Anemone Farm has been around for over a hundred years, within the same family, growing specialized flower crops, namely anemones and violets, in old-school glass greenhouses to sell at the NYC wholesale market and to florists up and down the East Coast. I have long been obsessed with the idea of visiting their operation. Late January was the perfect time to see the anemones in full bloom.

Lucky duck that I am, Ariella, most decidedly a kindred spirit, offered to take me there when I was up visiting her new farm. After an evening and a morning spent together, filled with rapid-fire farming Q&A, we pulled up next to the Battenfeld’s greenhouses and I nearly burst into tears. Inside the steamy glass were thousands of healthy happy colorful anemones. I have missed plants in bloom so very much in this horridly frigid winter that seems to never end. To be engulfed so completely and suddenly again in the long rows of anemones was true heaven and much needed medicine.

Lance and Morgan Battenfeld, the fifth generation at the farm, greeted us warmly and answered lots of questions about how they operate. The anemones are grown in deep raised beds that are about waist-high, making harvesting much faster and a lot easier on the back. Anemones are started from seed bred and collected at the farm each summer and then are grown on until they start blooming in the winter. There were eight or nine large houses, each a peaceful sea of colorful cheerful anemone faces. They’ve also been growing some ranunculus, but apparently the low light of winter makes them a less productive crop than the anemones at Battenfelds. There were a few small historic plantings of alstromeria and violets that were also interesting to see, if only for the heritage of them.

I was especially eager to learn more about their breeding program since Battenfeld’s has been introducing some new extra-showy varieties of anemones in recent seasons. We were lucky enough to find Fred Battenfeld himself in the breeding greenhouse and had a lovely chat as he showed us some of the ones he’s most excited about.

He crosses blooms according to color and the vitality of the plants until he has a good balance between color, stem length, productivity and plant health. Apparently he once developed a buttercup yellow anemone (can you imagine??), but the plant just wasn’t a strong enough grower to be used for cut flowers and alas it died out. He’s currently working on “splashes”, blooms that look like they’ve been dipped in watercolors. I saw blooms there that I have never seen anywhere else. One in particular, a barely-there lavender face with delicate veins of smoky plum, kept me fixated for several minutes.

Sadly, Battenfeld’s does not sell seed or corms. Trust me, I asked!! I did leave with several bunches of flowers to make these dark days of winter a little brighter. Battenfeld’s ships if you’d like to have your own little slice of heaven!