Discover the mimosa on the Côte d’Azur
Hello everyone!
I’m going to tell you about my favorite flower: the mimosa which blooms on the Cote d’Azur and therefore in the garden of our cottages www.locations-06.fr.
Every year, from January to March, the mimosa blooms on part of the Riviera, along a 130 kilometer route nicknamed The Golden Road which extends from the aptly named Bormes-les-Mimosas in the Var to Grasse, the world capital of perfume.
The mimosa was imported at the end of the 19th century by wealthy English winter visitors who were staying on the French Riviera and who wanted to adorn their gardens with it. The climate and the sun did the rest and the mimosa quickly developed.
So a real economy emerged around the plant, seeing mimosa plants and mimosa beds multiply.
Mimosa: the golden road
These mimosa growers whose addresses I can give you sell mimosa and eucalyptus all over the world which grow on the same sandy soils.
I really like the work of Stéphane Reynaud’s family in Pegomas as well as the Vial family in Tanneron.
At the La Familia restaurant, still in Tanneron, don’t miss the mimosa dessert.
Perfumers also love the scent of these yellow buds and include them in the composition of famous perfumes (Amarige by Givenchy, Perris Mimosa Tanneron, Paris by Yves Saint-Laurent, Champs-Élysées by Guerlin, etc.).
We talk about mimosa but we should talk about mimosas because there are more than 1,200 species of mimosas in the world (eg: Gallic, caterpillar mimosa = longifolia, limelight, they are in fact acacias). Their growth is rapid (30 to 60cm/year). Their finely cut or tapered green evergreen leaves and their abundant winter flowering in fragrant golden balls explain the great olfactory and visual success of mimosas in the garden.
Nowadays you can buy, near our cottages www.locations-06, cut mimosa, or potted mimosas to bring them back and try to plant them at home, mimosa syrups, sugar balls flavored with mimosa , mimosa soaps and creams, mimosa syrups, clothes with mimosa in the photo.
Don’t miss, 30 minutes from our gites www.locations-06.fr the traditional Fête du mimosa which takes place every year in Mandelieu in February. With its flower floats, music, and the famous flower battle, it is an unmissable winter event in the Alpes-Maritimes
