BLOOMS of orchids filled a festival last weekend as a third-generation family business celebrated their 70th anniversary.

Orchid specialists Burnham Nurseries, at Forches Cross, celebrated their landmark year with orchid displays and special guests.

Owner Sara Rittershausen said: ‘The weekend was a great success. We had lots of people from far away and local come to support and celebrate with us.

‘With thousands of orchids on site lots of people were milling around enjoying the flowers.

‘We had the chairman of the local orchid club displaying orchid-inspired jewellery, and a vanilla orchid company showing how they use the pods from the vanilla orchid plant for their essences and pastes.’

There were also displays from three orchid societies – Devon, Cornwall and South West – and talks from Sara on the history of her family business.

Sara’s grandfather Percy started growing orchids as a hobby before turning it into a business. He moved to Kingsteignton from the Home Counties in 1951.

She added: ‘Back then the nursery was surrounded by fields. When it was built on the developers called one of the roads Orchid Avenue, after the nursery.’

Sara’s dad, sister and mum continued the business until Sara took over the helm around nine years ago. It’s been on the Forches Cross site for 34 years.

The nursery entered the Chelsea Flower Show for 52 years and gained 20 gold medals for their displays during that time. They stopped Chelsea 10 years ago but still do more than 20 orchid shows a year all around the country.