In the garden a few weeks ago I noticed that the Sedum, given to me by my student Christine, was just starting to open its flowers. I was delighted because this year the flower seemed large enough to pick, whereas in its first year the flowers were quite small.
The slightly open flowers seemed to glow in the late afternoon sunlight.
Three weeks later the flowers had opened along the whole stem. Fortunately, I picked this stem before the recent hot weather occurred and it has kept well in a vase for a couple of weeks. The remaining flowers on the plant have now browned a little.
My student Val, who also grows rather beautiful sedum, was recently trimming the rather large strelitzia in her garden and I managed to save a few leaves from the green waste bin. It occurred to me that the rather matt surface of the strelitzia would complement the pale pink sedum.
I have arranged them both here in a black vase so that part of the paler underside of the leaf is visible. The strelitzia leaf which has a beautiful 'S' curve and projects quite a way forward as does the long stem of sedum that makes a contrasting mass on the left side. The vase is by Cor and Jan de Veth who worked in Cairns in the mid 1970's.
I subsequently made a second arrangement contrasting the sedum with a naturally angular line of acacia baileyana. The classical bottle-shaped vase is by Barry Singleton from Castlemaine.
On researching Sedum I was interested to note in the Wikipedia article that the original genus has been divided into three genera. Keeping track of these details must be a major challenge for serious Botanists.
On Tuesday last, Ikebana International Melbourne, Chapter No 29, celebrated its 60th anniversary; a very considerable accomplishment. Follow this link to photos from the Birthday Meeting.
Greetings from Christopher
17th March 2019
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