Bright Eyes Flax Seeds (Linum grandiflorum)

Linum grandiflorum “Bright Eyes”

“Bright Eyes” flax with large flowers: this selection plays on a striking contrast, with very pale pinkish-white petals centered by a dark red, almost black eye—hence its English name, “Bright Eyes.” Like all ornamental flax, each flower lasts only one morning, but flowering renews continuously throughout the summer.

Characteristics:

• Two-tone flowers: pinkish-white with a dark red center, creating a very clean graphic effect.
• Airy habit: slender stems and narrow foliage give borders a light, gently moving texture.
• Easy and undemanding: a hardy annual that needs very little.

Precautions:

• This species is strictly ornamental: unlike cultivated flax (Linum usitatissimum), its seeds are not intended for food consumption.

Sowing advice:

• Exposure: full sun is essential—its flowers remain closed in cloudy weather.
• Soil: light, sandy, poor, and well drained. It dislikes heavy soils and stagnant moisture. Do not fertilize: in rich soil, the stems become elongated and flop.
• Method: sow directly in place in spring, barely covering the seeds. Its fragile root does not tolerate transplanting well: avoid sowing in pots. Stagger sowings every three weeks to extend flowering. See how to sow your seeds.

Care advice:

• Almost none. Thin to 20 cm apart and water only during periods of severe drought.

Beneficial combinations:

• Its light colors contrast beautifully with the vivid red of red large-flowered flax, and it creates lovely meadows with cornflower. See combining flowers in the vegetable garden.

Benefits for biodiversity:

• Its flowers, which open each morning, provide nectar and pollen for bees and hoverflies throughout the warm season.
• Its seeds, left standing in autumn, feed small seed-eating birds.

Uses:

• Borders, rock gardens, edging, and flower meadows. Its stems are also suitable for country-style bouquets when picked in bud.

Harvesting your own seeds:
Allow the small round capsules to turn brown and dry completely on the plant, then gently crush them between your fingers over a container. Ornamental flax also readily self-seeds from one season to the next. See storing your seeds.

Our Commitment to Quality: at SemiSauvage - Permaculture, we grow and select our seeds with respect for living things as our guiding principle. Based near the Auvergne Volcanoes, we choose open-pollinated, non-hybrid varieties, test them for germination rates, and carefully sort and package them without any chemical treatment. Our belief: to give gardeners back the ability to sow, year after year, seeds that truly belong to them.

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