Something old, something new?

I went on a walkabout with a photography friend yesterday, location: Peterborough. Mostly in the Cathedral grounds, I wanted to be experimental, shutter speeds, exposures etc, and I knew in my minds eye how I would be editing this image, the photo straight out the camera looked quite dull - in colour - so masking it enabled me to brighten the roses and up the contrast on the background.

Need to work out why my pics are so dull though, I'd never noticed it before but am so much more now.