TWO HYDRANGEAS

In a Geelong class last year...

...the theme for Jo was to make an ikebana that represented a movement. In this case, the word she chose was 'entrapped'. A single Strelitzia flower is caught in a trap of Dietes grandiflora leaves which surround the flower. The leaves are tied with knots and a symbolic chain hangs down the front of the cylindrical vase.

Anne's exercise was to make an arrangement of vegetables and/or fruit on a table. This Sogetsu curriculum exercise is called "morimono", literally: "heaped things". She actually made two arrangements. This one really made me smile for its playfulness and unique cutting of the Zucchini.

I had set the senior students the task of making an ikebana on the theme of contrasting colours.

Maureen contrasted the orange of pincushion Leucospermum flowers with a blue vase. She used a dried branch for its linear and textual contrast.

Ellie contrasted yellow Kangaroo Paw Anigozanthos, with an unidentified blue flower. She too used a dried branch as a textural contrast.

Helen contrasted the orange of two Strelitzia flowers with a large blue ceramic vase. I think the purple leaves in the mouth of the vase are the cultivar Tradescantia "Purple Heart".

While out walking yesterday I noticed this Coastal sword-sedge Lepidosperma gladiatum. I have never before seen it at the peak of its flowering as is obvious here. In my ikebana this week I used three leaves of this plant that I had picked a couple of weeks ago.

I also used two of the cerise Hydrangea flower heads. Last year I had pruned this potted bush too hard and only had a couple of flowers. This year it has re-bounded. The pink flowers are a different Hydrangea cultivar.

I set two of the flower heads in a low flat-bottomed ceramic vase with inward sloping walls. This suited the flowers well as I cut the stems fairly short. The two flowers are massed one behind the other. I then arranged the three sedge leaves in looping curves around the flowers. The leaf on the left side had started to colour a warm brown as it ages.

The vessel is by the Australian ceramicist Owen Rye.

Greetings from Christopher

4th January 2026