The Flower Fairies are being reimagined by Taylors of Harrogate, whose lovely new magazine adverts pay homage to them.

Created by Croydon illustrator Cicely Mary Barker, each fairy is in charge of looking after a particular plant and singing a poem to it every day; Barker used children from her teacher sister’s nursery school as models, who posed patiently in a homemade flower fairy costume with the corresponding plant in their hand (though the plant was always a bit larger than to scale in the final illustration).

At Taylors HQ, many of the team grew up with the Flower Fairies – and it’s probably no surprise that people who work for a tea company identify with the little fairies’ jobs as caretakers of wonderful botanicals. So they drew a touch of inspiration from them when they teamed up with Kew Gardens on their range of fruit and herbal teas. And in working with Flower Fairies publishers Penguin Random House they found a striking coincidence.

When Barker couldn’t find a particular plant herself she would enlist the help of experts at nearby Kew Gardens. Her own close relationship with the botanical gardens is one that mirrors Taylors, as they worked together some 90 years after the flower fairies first flitted into the world! Find out more at taylorstea.co.uk