Flower Girls is the funny, beautifully observed and uplifting story of a group of disabled women who live and work at The Crippleage, Edgware. Inspired by the personal testimony and reminiscences of real-life Flower Girls, the play shifts effortlessly between the unsettled early years of World War II and the seemingly more liberated world of 1965. Their stories reveal an indomitable spirit and a fierce determination to find their place in the world, a world that prefers to keep them at a safe distance.

A red button. From a red coat…I collected them. From every coat of every new arrival at the orphanage, before they were sold to the rag man. And I would wait until they were at their homesick worst. A penny to hold it, a shilling to keep it.

Britain’s foremost disabled-led theatre company Graeae joins forces with The New Wolsey Theatre Ipswich to present the world premiere of this play on 5 October 2007. The play is published as a programme text to coincide with the production.