Garden labels are normally among the more practical accessories we add to our growing spaces. They tell us where we planted the basil, remind us which pot contains thyme and hopefully prevent us from forgetting what we planted three months earlier. Growing Allegedly has decided that they might as well make us laugh at the same time.
The South African gardening brand has opened its Growing Allegedly online store on Featsy, where gardeners can now buy handmade pyrography garden tags featuring a selection of wonderfully silly plant and herb puns.
For gardeners who enjoy adding a little personality to their pots, vegetable patches and herb gardens, these are considerably more entertaining than sticking a plain plastic label into the soil. It’s also suitable for bonsai enthusiasts growing bonsai companions in their garden.
Handmade Pyrography Garden Tags
What immediately caught my attention was that these aren’t simply printed garden markers. Growing Allegedly creates the designs using pyrography, with the wording individually burned into the wooden tags by hand.
That means slight differences between individual pieces are part of their handmade nature rather than imperfections. The tags retain the natural appearance of the wood while the burned lettering provides the decorative element.
The tags are also treated with an eco-friendly, food-safe sealant, which is particularly appropriate when you’re placing them alongside herbs and other edible plants.
Growing Allegedly currently has several garden-tag products available through its Featsy stall, including punny herb markers and collections of humorous general garden tags.
Herb Puns Belong in the Garden
The punny herb collection is where things become especially entertaining. Instead of simply burning “Basil” or “Thyme” onto a piece of wood and calling the job finished, Growing Allegedly has created individual jokes around the herb names.
There are currently eleven designs listed for the single herb tags:
- BASIL-ically amazing, CHIVE talkin’, I CLOVE you dearly, CORIANDER what may, Kind of a big DILL, MINT to be, OREGA-no drama, It’s PARSLEY my fault, ROSEMARY’S baby herb, SAGE advice and THYME of my life.
Yes, they’re gloriously cheesy. That’s precisely why I like them.
A garden doesn’t always need to be completely serious. We spend enough time worrying about watering schedules, pests, soil mixtures, fertilisers, pruning and whether that expensive plant we bought last weekend has already decided to die. There is absolutely room for something that makes you grin while checking the herbs.
Singles and Sets Are Available
The herb tags are available individually as well as in sets, giving gardeners the option of choosing one particular favourite or creating a larger collection.
At the time of writing, a single punny pyrography herb tag costs R35, while the three-pack is listed at R99 and the five-pack at R155. The individual listing lets buyers choose which herb pun they want, making it possible to match the marker to something already growing at home.
That flexibility is useful if you only have a couple of herbs growing on a kitchen windowsill or balcony. Someone with a larger herb collection can instead choose one of the multi-packs.
Growing Allegedly has also expanded beyond herb-specific labels with funny pyrography garden tags available as a five-pack. These follow the same basic idea of combining useful garden markers with humour, rather than treating every garden accessory as purely functional.
A Fun Gift for Plant Lovers
These tags also strike me as the sort of gardening gift that works particularly well when you don’t know exactly what equipment somebody already owns.
Buying tools for an experienced gardener can be difficult. They probably already have a favourite pair of secateurs, preferred fertilisers and more pots than they are willing to admit. Plants themselves can be equally tricky because you need to know what conditions the recipient has available.
A handmade garden marker is different. It doesn’t require another patch of sunlight, isn’t going to outgrow its pot and hopefully won’t die because somebody forgot to water it.
The Growing Allegedly tags could work as small gifts for gardeners, plant parents and herb growers, particularly when combined with a potted herb or gardening hamper. The handmade pyrography also gives them a different