Bishop of Llandaff’ has a lot to answer for. Not so long ago, dahlias were as de rigueur as plastic gnomes and not half as ironic. They were untrendy, unfashionable and, more often than not, simply ghastly. Then along came the Bishop, with his rich alizarin robes and brilliant chrome-yellow centre. He quickly became popular among the very people who hated dahlias, setting a thoroughly bad example. Then before you could say ‘Arabian Night’ or ‘Grenadier’, dahlias started popping up all over gardens that had hitherto known better – and we had all come to just adore them.
Well, almost… not the nasty vulgar sort, of course, the dahlias that looked like a deliciously brash wedding hat, sitting over a raucous laugh, with a fag in one hand, and a gin and orange in the other. Not the dahlias
