2019 was the ninth year of The Big Sunflower Project. This year seeds were sent across the UK and to The Netherlands, Germany, Hungary, Sweden, Lithuania and Germany and sunflowers were also grown in Canada, the USA and Argentina. For the third time the project was joined by people growing sunflowers in memory of Emil, who was diagnosed with myotubular myopathy and sadly passed away in 2016. And for the first time sunflowers were grown in Australia, for George who has myotubular myopathy.
Sunflower growing season is now over in the UK but if you are in a part of the world about to get its summer, please consider buying a packet of seeds and growing a sunflower to raise awareness of centronuclear and myotubular myopathy, we would love to continue receiving sunflower photos over the winter months.
The Big Sunflower Project is only possible because of the kindness of the organisations who support our work with donations, discounts, funding and publicity. Sunflower seeds for The Big Sunflower Project 2019 were provided by Kings Seeds, who provided 300 packets of seeds at a large discount.
Seeds were also donated by people who harvested seeds from sunflowers they grew during the 2018 project – thank you Katrin, Mike and the University of Leicester Social Impact team. In addition the project received a £200 donation from Cheshire West Voluntary Action, a £150 donation from Sanctuary Housing and a donation of stamps from project participant Sue.
The Big Sunflower Project was also recently featured in the Liverpool Echo and we are grateful to Semble and the Liverpool Echo for making this happen. You can read the article below.
Project map
This year 300 places were plotted on the project map which can be seen below – click a sunflower to learn more about the people growing sunflowers in that location.
Photos
Over 700 photos were received from 81 participants this year. Every photo received was posted on social media to raise awareness of centronuclear and myotubular myopathy. Photos from the 2019 project can be found below.
Stories
Thank you to every one who shared their story with the project this year. The new stories can be found below.
Participant stories are incredibly important as they show the reach and impact of the project. If you would like to share your story too, please get in touch.
Harvesting sunflower seeds
Don’t forget that if you have grown a sunflower this year you can save the seeds for growing next year or you can donate these to the project for others to grow. You can learn how to harvest your sunflower seeds below.
Make a donation
There is no charge for project seeds or the cost of postage, the project does however, welcome donations to ensure the future of the project and to enable seeds to be sent to as many people as possible each year. If you have donated for your seeds, thank you – if you like to donate you can learn more about how to do this below.
The Big Sunflower Project 2020
Preparations are already underway for The Big Sunflower project 2020. This is a milestone year for the project as it will be the tenth year we have grown sunflowers to raise awareness of centronuclear and myotubular myopathy. You can read below how the project began.
100 packets of seeds have already been donated by Thompson and Morgan and seeds will shortly be arriving from Tamar Organics and Grow Seed. Harvested seeds from 2019 project participants are also promised.
We have also been able to obtain discounted postage stamps for 2020. Stamps are a major expense for the project and if we were say to send seeds to 300 people during the year, at current prices (83p for a large second class stamp) this would cost £249.00. Stamps for the 2020 project have been purchased with a discount of between 8 – 12% so is a massive saving which we will now be able to use elsewhere – thank you to Mike Abram for all his hard work sorting this for the project.
Next year we will once again be joined by our friends Zusammenstark, growing sunflowers for Emil. You can learn more about their involvement on their website below.
Further information
Further information about the project can be found on here on the project website and on the project social media pages.
Seed distribution for The Big Sunflower Project will begin again in early 2020. An announcement will be made on social media advising when seed applications are once again being accepted.
The Big Sunflower Project 
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