Growing up in India, Sonia and Shilpa Malik would grow dahlias with their family, and when the pandemic hit in 2020, the sister’s decided to get their creative energy out by using their green thumbs.
It was Shilpa’s brain child after her full-time job transitioned to working from home due to the pandemic.
“She had extra time and she said we should grow flowers,” said Sonia. “We had always grown them in India and so we ripped up her backyard and planted a whole bunch of dahlias and then we ripped out the front yard and planted more.”
Sonia said that they had so many dahlias that they didn’t know what to do and they ended up calling the Bradford Farmers Market.
“We booked a booth for four months and we had so many flowers that we wanted to share with the community,” she said. “We had a great response and realized we had something here.”
Both Sonia and Shilpa have full-time jobs, but growing flowers quickly became their passion project and after their success at the farmers market, they decided that they would like to start an organic farm.
“We started looking for some rural land and found this place that’s about an acre and a half,” said Sonia. “It was almost the same price as my sister’s place, so we felt it was a good deal.”
That’s when Larkspur Garden in East Gwillimbury was born, located 2821 Mount Albert Rd., where the sisters grow dahlias, lisianthus, and snapdragons, among other bright and beautiful flowers.
“The biggest challenge has been taming the land because what we bought was a forest of weeds, but even last year we managed to grow a lot of flowers,” said Sonia. “I’m in the banking industry and one of my clients even introduced me to a florist and she liked our flowers, so we sell basically everything to that one florist in Toronto.”
As the flower farm begins to establish itself, the goal is to eventually be a farm store that sells homegrown products.
“We’ve already built the store,” said Sonia. “We want to be in the community and share what we grow with the community. We believe in the older barter system, you give and take with each other and that’s the idea behind this. We want to get to know our community.”
Another key component to the farm is the way in which the sisters grow and maintain their crop.
“We love to work with the land and we want to give back to the land,” said Sonia. “Everyone uses pesticides, and we want to take care of weeds without using them.”
The reason dahlias are the main focus as they get started is because of their family's history with the flower.
“Our dad used to grow them and was so proud of their size,” said Sonia. “He’s not with us anymore, but that stuck with us.”
Larkspur Garden will be holding a meet and greet Sept. 3, learn more about the farm here.
