About Design By Nature

About Design By Nature (Ireland) – Another World Class Irish Family Business

Our ‘Passion with Purpose’ is ‘Growing and Selling Wildflower Seeds, Plants and Plants Parts and Saving Species from Extinction’

If we hadn’t started saving species in the 1980’s and if our customers didn’t act to grow them, more species would be extinct today.

Our owner Sandro says “In this the ‘AGE OF NATURE’, our Aim is to supply and help everyone to grow wild plants, many are near endangered, and together we can save them.
All we ask is you learn enough to help them grow and flower properly. Please, no half measures, get them flowering, and Wildflowers will speak up for themselves”

Sandro Cafolla T/a Design By Nature, owners of Wildflowers.ie

Established in 1990, Design By Nature is an Artisan Craft Horticulture micro-enterprise based on Laois/Carlow border, Ireland.
Specializing in native Irish wildflower seeds and plantations, the company has garnered an impressive national and international clientele, including: The EU & Government of Ireland, City of New York’s Battery Park Irish Hunger Memorial, Keelings, Phizer, Apple, Intel, King Charles’ Dutchy Brand, The National Trust UK, Vodafone, QVC TV,  and the local school down the road from where you are now. We helped many a team win Floral locale, Chelsea and Bloom Gold Medals.

Accredited and Trusted

Department of Agriculture (DAFM) Registration number IECS-44

Our Seed House is registered with the Dept’ of Agriculture (DAFM):
No: (IECS-44) Native Sourced Irish Wildflower Seed Grower, Harvester, Supplier, Processor, Mixer, and Packer’. We also offer Design and Solutions Services for the Conservation and Utilisation of Wild Flora

Design By Nature is an Irish Reg’ Business: 109182 | Vat: IE 0 3656298P

Turnover: Weather dependent between €300k – €450k p.a, Average profits 6%

Our reinvestment in direct genetic conservation €20k-60k p.a (wages and materials)

To assure ‘Native’, we carefully collect limited amounts of wild seeds & plant materials in the ‘real’ wild, (away from cross pollinators), we propagate these in our genebank, ‘grow on’ in our nursery, ‘plant out’ as crops, (hundred of acres) and then produce seeds for sale from the progeny.

link xxx Accredited and Trusted 2

(DAFM) Registration number IECS-44 link xxxxx

  • Our seeds are Conservation Grade ideal for projects listed as UN Decade of Ecosystems Restoration 2021-2030, xxxxxxx UN Decade of Ecosystems Restoration link xxxxx
  • We are a Direct Action Workforce saving Genetic Resources in ‘The Age of Nature’ and Guardians of the Largest Living Genebank of Ireland’s Native Plant Species. The E.U. Genetic Resources Policy recognizes our Actions as High Priority and that Genetic Resource Business like ours are vital for the survival of Europe’s Nature.

Design By Nature receives no funding and we are not a charity. We are independent to SPEAK OUT FOR FLORA

Our Guarantee

Design By Nature is the very first seed company in the world to offer a three-year guarantee on wildflower seed mixtures.

Our products can be seen to Grow over the long-term, sure why wouldn’t they, there entirely Irish origin, sourced with known provenance and so few failures, that we can afford to replace seeds.
For Trade professional or Gardening public alike, Our guarantee makes wildflower growing accessible, supporting our customers every step of the way. We guarantee our seed until it flowers, and since most are perennials they take at least 3 years to grow and flower. (TnC’s photos required), we offer a three year guarantee at a minimum.
link xxx Guarentee

Our Customers

All our Gardening Customers Support our Work of Saving Species

For 35+ years, we supplied thousands of Irish gardening customers, Now its your turn!

We sell direct to trade and public from our wildflower shop and indirectly via re-sellers.

We POST product direct to Gardeners, Tidy-town ‘n Schools, customers include Farmers & Community Groups & Clubs.

We assist Designers and Ecologists in providing consumer solutions for their individual clients

TRADE:

DBN offers a ‘bunch’ of B2B Products and Services

  • B2T – Business to Trade. Amenity and Landscape Horticulture and Professional Gardeners
  • B2G – Business to Government and EU. Ecosystems Restoration and Conservation
  • B2PR – Business to Public Relations, CSR, Greening and Re-Wilding
  • PP2B – HNV Plants Part Supply to Biopharma, Botanicals and Florist.

ALL PRODUCTS PROVIDE ECOSYSTEM SERVICES

We don’t do ‘Green Washing’. We recently refused 200,000 seed pack supply order to a major Cider producer who wanted to sell Alcohol with a wildflower seed giveaway. We refused but the National Biodiversity Centres Pollinator Plan provided the ‘Green Washing’  by awarding a Pollinator sticker to the firms products. We said if they grow wildflowers in the orchards to keep pests off the Apple trees we would supply the seed, theydidn’t, we didn’t, but the Pollinator plan sold out on your behalf, and we a lost €184,000 order and didn’t get to spend the €11,040 profits on species conservation.

Meet the 'SeedHeads' Team

Our Staff and Farmers

Head Office

Sandro Cafolla: Owner and Business Manager, Trade Sales, Web author.

June Treacy:  Admin and Accounts, HR, Sales and Services Manager

Complaints: info@wildflowers.ie, ref: your p.o, quote or invoice number

Design By Nature’s ‘Seedheads Team’:

We believe in the right to a fulfilling livelihoods built on doing what we believe in. We practice both organic and conventional farming, always leaning toward sustainability. We all work together as a team.

Martin Rice: Team Manager, Lead Harvester & Crop & Seed Production, Plot Combine Specialist.

Niall Wallis: Craft Gardening, Bees (NIHBS) and Wildflower Crop & Seed Production,

Joe Farrel: Organic Systems Crop & Seed Production, Weed Control, Combine Harvesting and Seed Processing.

Molly Ailsbury:  Sales, Genebank, Nursery and Wildflower Crop & Seed Production

Carmel Murphy: IT, Purchasing, H&S trainee, Genebank, Nursery and Wildflower Crop & Seed Production

Ben Reed: Trainee/ student

DBN wish to thank all past employees whose commitment and hard work have made wildflower growing ‘mainstream’

Sustainable Farming Practices

We are REALISTS, we do not tell our grower farmers how to manage their land, We use their existing techniques and ween them slowly to more sustainable practices, many have now more nature friendly farms and a few even get additional DAFM/EU grants now that they realise the value of growing wildflowers as they get paid for Biodiversity.

Herbicides are only recommended or used as a short-term measure where weeds or invasive grass are present. We then help establish chemical-free ecosystem. Once a meadow crop is established we are obliged to kill DOCK weed & THISTLE and other noxious banned weeds. – DAFM regulation/Noxious weed act

OUR CARBON FOOTPRINT, IS A JOKE, even when running diesel farm machinery we sequester far more tons than we use,  last time I checked we sequestered 60% more greenhouse gases than we consumed due to our meadows and products capturing carbon in the soil.

80% of our buildings are using recycled construction materials, Our solar drying polytunnel plastics get double life expectancy due to skilled use and ends up becoming ‘Dust Covers’ for years before proper disposal. Our seed store is passively designed with no artificial cooling, we use shade from trees for cool air flow outside the vents and deep insulation inside.  Enough said, if it matters so much come and visit by appointment please.

Legacy and Innovation

Our impact is visible across the Irish landscape — and beyond. We have photographically documented our work and have become well-known as innovators, creating new avenues in the horticultural sector. Today, the industry we helped pioneer employs hundreds of professionals, from scientists to Eco-gardeners. Our work has inspired international counterparts, with several foreign wildflower industries replicating our seed mixtures and approaches and the USA government taking a lead from us when it comes to species conservation.

We are also pioneers in genetic conservation, we even helped Anita and Tommy Hayes establish SEED SAVERS. Co Clare.

We also help founded IOFGA. the 1st Irish Organic Association and The Health and Safety Authority through our involvement in founding the Alliance for Safety and Health, prior to the formation of the HSE and Europe’s first ever Outdoor industrial Health and Safety plan for Wavin (Ire) part of Royal Dutch Shell. The EU then employed Shell to develop Europe’s first and pioneering Health and Safety policy and laws.

We even help the competition: Lately, our work is directly helping  re-establish the famous Powers Family back into selling flora, now called ‘SeedTech’ with subsidiary ‘Connecting to Nature’  growing and selling seed sourced from and sown by us in their wildflower crops

We won the funding with ‘persuasion’ for the Genetic Resources Trust which evolved into the Conservation of Plant and Animal Genetic Resources Scheme (DAFM) 2020, formerly Genetic Resources Grant Aid Scheme. We also inspired the National Botanic Gardens and Trinity Colleges establish seed genebanks. But theirs are not living Genebanks, ours are. LINK XXXXX

Sandro was an Anti-nuclear activist in late 1980’s and today says “Nukes may be made to run safe but uranium mining will never be” He uses his ‘PEOPLE POWER’ Skills and understanding to embarrass others to act directly for Nature, ‘No more reports’.

Mission and Values

Design By Nature is not just a business, we are a force for species conservation.

We are ‘The unofficial political wing of wildflowers’

Our goal has always been to use enterprise as a tool to protect plant species from extinction.
Rather than relying on charity, we generate profit to fund nature conservation, acting independently and creatively in our mission.

All our profits beyond livelihood and wages are directed towards species conservation.

“Our business saves species from extinction with the profits raised from selling wildflowers, We are proud to be the only authentic wildflower seed producer in Ireland who is specializing exclusively in 32 county native-sourced Irish wildflower seeds and a few worthwhile honorary natives. we are not eco -fascists, we love all plants.

We re-invest profits in finding ‘pre’-‘pre-basic’ wild sources of seed, we go to great lengths to insure the sources of our crops are truly wild and not cross bred with foreign imported species posing as ‘natives’.

Once collected dried and processed to store or sow, we then propagate small beds (Living Genebanks) from which we reproduce larger farm crops.  From these we sell seeds and plants.