A MODERN TEA PARTY WITH DIY OMBRE TABLECLOTH

Photography: Kelly Harmer

Well my friends, living in the UK we don’t exactly get to dine ‘al fresco’ too often so I’ve teamed up with Plymouth Tea to bring the summer indoors and create our own afternoon tea soiree with a modern twist.

I mean, when a luxury tea brand wants to work with you and there’s an excuse to eat delicious food whilst trying out the range of teas, what girl is going to say no?

Luckily for you I never do things by halves when it comes to the details and DIYs and this soiree is no different, so grab yourself a cuppa of delicious tea and a slice of cake and enjoy while I share it all with you…

I’ve seen a lot of afternoon tea soirees adorned with vintage prints, lace and doilies and don’t get me wrong I love it, but I decided to go for a modern twist with a nod to the history of afternoon tea by using the green vintage Wedgwood passed down through our family. Plymouth Tea has itself acknowledged the rich history of its City by the names given to much of its collection; my personal favourite is the Drake’s Blend ‘strong in body, full of flavour, English Breakfast tea’. Delish!

Every afternoon tea soiree needs a selection of tea and with luxury like Plymouth Tea it seemed only fitting to create a dedicated station complete with pretty flowers in a teapot from Jess at Secret Garden Flowers. You could easily do the same by placing wet oasis in the base of a teapot before arranging the flowers.

Jess also provided the flowers used in the copper geometric tea light holders for the food table which were another modern twist to the decor, along with the cute little cupcake arrangements. Aren’t they adorable?

If you know me by now, you’ll know that I can’t help but throw in a DIY project here and there, and this time was the pink ombre tablecloth I’ve been dye-ing (see what I did there?) to make for a while. Full DIY here.

To bring the summer indoors I literally brought the birds and the flower bed courtesy of my friends at Talking Tables who provided all of the decorations including my favourite geometric plates ever!

Decor and tea station – tick! So the next important element was of course the food and I enlisted the help of the incredibly talented Macaroom of Bristol to create the sweet treats. I loved the texture of the showstopper cake and those donuts and macarons complete with edible flowers and gold leaf were almost too good to eat.

Another modern twist was the open sandwich platters made up of triangular cream cheese bases topped with thinly sliced cucumber and radish, and circular cream cheese bases topped with smoked salmon and edible flowers. We used Dianthus petals and Nasturtium flower heads from my parents’ garden.

It’s fascinating that Plymouth Tea actually grows its own tea in Devon’s first ever tea plantation born out of a link through a community growing project and that every time this tea is purchased and delivered to somebody’s door they are contributing to the development of this incredible project. I’d love to visit one day. You can read more about this story here.

It’s safe to say that this modern afternoon tea soiree brought a whole lot of summer to our autumnal kitchen and I loved sharing all of this deliciousness with my family and friends.

Please tag @ohsokel and use #OSKinspired on Instagram if you create something after seeing this post. I’d love to see the results!

Until next time,

OSK xx

This post was made possible by sponsorship from Plymouth Tea who made this super exciting shoot possible.

Contributors: Decor from Talking Tables // Cakes from Macaroom // Flowers fromSecret Garden Flowers of Axbridge

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