FINCHINGFIELD LAVENDER
Est 2018
Visit Us
Our wild flower meadow is in bloom from Mid May onwards.
Our variety of Lavender is in bloom from the beginning of July until mid August.
(Please note: as with any natural crop, blooming times and duration depend on the weather and can vary each year. We do our best to keep visitors updated as the summer progresses, but nature can be unpredictable — so pick a date, come along, and enjoy the beauty and tranquillity of the farm regardless!)
We are a small, friendly micro lavender farm and campsite that values peace and tranquillity for all our visitors.
We're ticket only to visit the lavender farm and cafe as we are one site with access to everything once you are here. To ensure a peaceful environment, we limit the number of day visitors each day. All visits can be pre-booked online in advance.
What to expect:
Micro Lavender Field:
Our 3.5 km of hand-planted Lavandula × intermedia ‘Grosso’ offers a beautiful and intimate lavender experience.
If you’re looking for endless rows of lavender, that’s not us — but if you’re after a small, friendly, family-run farm in a picturesque countryside setting, where you can enjoy nature, wildflowers, and a relaxed afternoon tea with a view, we’d love to welcome you.
Relax amongst the lavender:
Throughout the field, you’ll find deck chairs, sun loungers, hay bale sofas, chairs, and picnic blankets to make your visit as comfortable as possible. Whether you’d like to rest under a shade sail or bask in the sunshine, the choice is yours.
Pick your own Lavender:
Available to pre-book or purchase on the day. We provide scissors, a bag, and a bucket so you can wander the field and pick your own bunch to take home. You’ll also receive information about our lavender variety and tips on how to pick and care for it.
Café:
Our on-site café serves a lovely selection of hot and cold drinks, alongside freshly delivered cakes and savoury baked goods — perfect for a light lunch or a well-earned treat. We don’t prepare food on-site as we’re set within a remote field, but we focus on offering quality baked goods from local suppliers, brought in fresh each morning to make your visit as enjoyable as possible. We have seating inside and outside available.
Afternoon tea picnic boxes:
Indulge in one of our freshly prepared afternoon tea boxes, available by pre-order only. Each box is prepared daily offsite and ready for you to enjoy amongst the lavender or in our picnic area.
Facilities:
We provide composting toilets and three urinals exclusively for day visitors.
Accessibility:
Our lavender field is mostly flat, with level access from the car park. The ground is natural meadow (not hard standing), but many visitors using wheelchairs and mobility scooters have found access manageable.
Our café currently has a small step at the entrance, but there is plenty of accessible outdoor seating and shaded areas available.
Please note: the toilet facilities have two steps leading up to them.
If you have specific accessibility requirements, please get in touch — we’re always happy to help where possible.
Dog Free venue:
No dogs allowed - as we are a no dog campsite and we have lots of fluffy chickens, runner ducks and a cheeky couple of Chinese geese.
Pre-booked afternoon tea picnic box
Pre-order when you buy your ticket. Available only up to 48 hours before your arrival. Veggie, vegan and gluten free options available. For any other allergies or dietary requirements you can select the option to purchase with your ticket and email us your dietary requirements.
Each picnic box contains:
Selection of finger sandwiches (1 round)
Homemade Cumberland sausage roll
Broccoli & cheddar quiche
Freshly baked homemade fruit scone
served with clotted cream & strawberry jam
Freshly baked triple chocolate brownie
one tea or coffee from our cafe
Book a gift voucher
We offer a range of summer experiences including yoga sessions among the lavender, wreath-making workshops, afternoon tea boxes, and Pick-Your-Own lavender. Tickets for our 2026 season will go on sale in March.
If you're looking for a thoughtful gift in the meantime, gift vouchers are available now. You’ll receive a unique code that the recipient can redeem against any of our experiences when bookings open. Perfect for Christmas, birthdays, or any special occasion.
THE LAVENDER
Lavandula × intermedia 'Grosso' is known for its deep purple flowers and powerful aroma which carries across the meadow as the plant releases oil from its leaves in the heat. The purple haze on the landscape starts in July and gradually deepens over a few weeks and lasts right up until September.
We have lump clay soil in this part of Essex, lavender loves poor quality free draining soil so lots of stone and wood chip was needed to improve the drainage before planting. 80 tonnes of stone and 30 tonnes of woodchip were spread over the field and then shallow ploughed into the soil. We customised a Norfolk potato plough with the help of Phil the Farmer into a Lavender row ridger and then ridged our flower beds to provide even more drainage.
Here on the farm we harvest by hand as it's the quickest way to cut and bunch for a farm of our size. The lavender is then hung in our drying shed until dry and ready for sale. We also make oil which is used in candles and other products.
GET INVOLVED
Whether your visit coincides with Easter tree planting, wild flower seed broadcasting or Lavender harvest we have plenty to do here on the farm. Get in touch and arrange a fun filled day of getting back to nature and seeing instant results of your hard days work.
Volunteer at harvest:
We harvest part of the field, leaving the rest looking beautiful for visitors. We harvest to make dried lavender products and send to other small businesses who then make products that we thens sell in our shop and cafe.
Volunteers are needed for a shift between 8am - 1pm.
Tea and coffee and water is provided as well as an afternoon tea box per person to be enjoyed in the lavender field after the shift.
Volunteers will be required to help cut the fresh blooms for dried bunches and oil harvesting, weeding and any other harvest related jobs.
We have completed a successful harvest already for 2025 so won't need any more help this year, however if you would like to help in the future please complete your details in the link below.
How it all began
We are not actually quite sure how or why we are here.... but we craved the countryside and cycled around many of the surrounding villages and Finchingfield and fell in love with the area. I'm pretty sure some wine was then involved, shortly after a few searches on the internet for land for sale and that was it... the serious business plan and research began. A year later in 2015 the gravity and reality hit as we collected the keys of a 'project' farmhouse in need a lot of love and hard graft and 9 acres of grassland.
We set about our smallholding adventure in to create a beautiful landscape to share and live on and from. While working full time in our 'normal jobs' and commuting we worked on the field to prep for planting. In the meantime potting up and growing 5000 little bushy lavenders ready to be planted a year later.
One and a half acres of the grassland is now home to 27 rows filled with 4,500 deep purple Lavender Grosso all hand planted in June 2018 with the help of friends family and our fabulous neighbours.
The rest of the field has been left to self seed and is flourishing with native wild orchids, ox-eye Daisy, cornflowers and poppies. The campsite part of the acreage is set within the wildflower meadow with mowed pathways leading to facilities and pitches.
Every year we add and tweak to make things more beautiful and we hope that you enjoy it as much as we do.
