HORIZONTAL ARRANGEMENT USING ONE COLOUR

The cascading flowers in the bamboo vase of last weeks entry were correctly identified by Joan Norbury (and Kath Dacy) as Hardenbergia. This a native from the east side of Australia and is sometimes known as false sarsaparilla or happy wanderer. I had mistaken it for one of the Kennedias from Western Australia.

This weeks theme in my teacher's class was a horizontal arrangement using material of multiple shades of one colour. The agapanthus will immediately tell you that the colour I chose was blue. Not very noticeable behind the agapanthus is a single stem of rather intense blue echium ( a picture of which was also included in last weeks blog entry), to the right is buddleja salviifolia and rosemary. The budlia is really mauve, of course, and the green leaves were left because  looked rather dramatic with some of their backs showing a silvery green. The vase, by Graeme Wilkie, is ceramic with a crazed grey glaze.

Below is another interpretation of the theme by my fellow student Eugenia Chudacek. She has used leucadendron, a yellow grevillia (cascading down the vase) and an unnamed vine, in a ceramic vase. The angle of the photograph is not good. The grevillia should be against the side of the ceramic vase.

Joan Norbury, who also attends the class, created a design of repeated shapes using golden stemmed dogwood on the left and a yellow tinged monstera deliciosa leaf on the right side in a glass vase. 

The arrangement I made three weeks ago using Japonica continues to look good as I remove wilting petals and refresh the water. As the new blossoms open they are more pale than before. This week I have added some blue Dutch iris that I had bought to use in the above horizontal arrangement. As they were not needed I was able to give the Japonica a fresh feel with these contrasting lines and colours.

This morning (Sunday) I made this arrangement in the entrance of the house. I have used four handless beakers that we had bought in Mashiko. I gathered the material from the cliff top and the roadside when I went on a short walk. The leaves are a native sedge, the wattle is Acacia Pycnantha. The tiny white flowers I haven't identified. The grow on a shrub that can be up to about 1.5 meters in diameter.

Here is a close up of the beakers are slip cast and made by Shimazaki Saori. Each one has a different raised surface design and they all have some colour at the rim, one blue and the others a faint yellow.

If you click on the following link you will go the the blog of Ohki Yoshiya whom I met at the Sogetsu Headquarters: 

http://blog.goo.ne.jp/yoshiyaohki


Greetings from Christopher 
14th August 2011