Three days ago was the first day of Spring and the evidence is in the garden. The apricot that I pruned about 3 months ago had its first flowers open this week.
This one at the tip of a branch was so high I had no choice but to photograph it against the slightly cloudy sky.
I was able to get up close to these two blossoms on a lower branch.
When I went for a walk yesterday evening I was delighted to see this Running Postman * kennedia prostrata flowering quite prolifically beside a beach carpark.
We have planted it in our garden but it is not doing as well as in the photo above.
Some of my students are having their first lessons in the slanting nageire (tall, straight- sided vase) style. This is an elegant form of ikebana, but takes quite a bit of practise to get the branches fixed securely at the correct angles.
The arrangement above, using flowering prunus branches and a native
leptospermum *, was made by Val.
In another class, Maureen created this interesting freestyle nageire. The exercise was to use pine and any other material. Because she found the fine curving lines of the pine interesting, to emphasise them she removed all the large needles. She has contrasted the pine with Pinwheel flower of a leucospermum * .
My ikebana this week is a massed arrangement of chrysanthemum flowers in a visually strong ceramic vessel by Pippin Drysdale * . The vase is decorated with fine alternating lines of blue and red glaze; so I have kept the mass very low and left a space on the righthand side to reveal the intense red interior of the vase.
Remember the Ikebana International Exhibition starts in Melbourne on Tuesday next, 6th to 16th September.
Greetings from Christopher
3rd September 2016
* Click on the blue text for further information
Great arrangements. You are a wonderful teacher. Have a fun time at the exhibition! Looking forward to your photos of it. Best to you both, Michael
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