Family Growers · Hand-Plucked
The Harvest
One morning, one flower, plucked by hand at first light.
The Family Growers
We partner with family growers across several high-altitude regions, each one still family-run, still hand-picked, still bound to the cold dry nights and mineral-rich soil where the flower thrives.
The Terroir
The regions we source from share a single set of conditions. Volcanic, mineral-rich soil holds water through the dry months and releases it slowly. High elevation brings cold, dry nights that concentrate the crocin in the threads.
It is the same combination that has given saffron its reputation for centuries, wherever the crocus is grown well, at height, in lean and stony ground.
One Morning Only
The Crocus sativus opens for a single morning. The petals close again before noon and the stigmas begin to oxidise. If the growers are not in the field at first light, that day's flowers are gone.
So the picking starts at dawn. Each crocus is plucked by hand, one at a time, and carried back in cane baskets before the sun climbs and the blooms begin to fold.
Three Stigmas From Each Flower
Inside each crocus are three crimson stigmas. The yellow style attached to them is not saffron. It dilutes the colour, dulls the aroma, lowers the grade. We separate them by hand, on linen, the same afternoon.
It takes roughly 150 flowers to fill a single gram. A skilled picker fills four grams in a morning. We pay by the hour, not by the gram.
“We grew patient because the flower does not negotiate.”Daniel · third-generation grower
Packed in Britain
The threads travel vacuum-sealed and shipped overnight to our kitchen in SW11. Every batch is tested at an accredited UK laboratory against the ISO 3632 standard before it is opened.
We pack into food-grade glass, metal or plastic, by hand, in batches of forty. Every pack leaves with a unique QR code that traces back to the field photograph and the lab certificate for that exact harvest.
100%
Hand-plucked Crocus sativus.
150
Flowers in a single gram.
3
Generations growing here.
270+
Crocin units (Category I).