RE-USED BANKSIA PRAEMORSA

In a recent Geelong class...

Anne made an ikebana arrangement "Using Vine"; in this case Hardenbergia comptoniana and Sea Holly Eryngium. Unfortunately, the vine was too weak to support its own weight for the intended exercise of a horizontal ikebana. However, it was a great opportunity to learn how to get this material to be sufficiently self-supporting to create a looped line with two small masses of the Sea Holly.

The senior students were tasked with making an ikebana using "Pine and any other material". 

Maureen used two branches of Casuarina, sometimes called Australian pine, which has needle-like fine branchlets and cone-like fruit. The branch on the left was set to accentuate its curving line contrasting with the mouth of the vessel that leans to the right. Three scarlet Grevillea inflorescences draw the eye back to the centre of the ikebana.

 

Christine used Cypress branches arranged obliquely across the top of her vessel. White Iris flowers contrasted with the deep green of the Cypress foliage.

Maree arranged a mass of pine needles in an irregularly-shaped piece of wood. She added a line with a dried stem of an ornamental Allium.

Jo arranged the end of a pine stem upside down in a rectangular glass vessel. The majority of the materials were place below the water line. A vertical row of Cherry tomatoes was set on the left side.

My ikebana this week is made with materials re-used from last week's ikebana. It is a "One Material Only" arrangement of Banksia praemorsa. This view is side-on to show that the large flower spike extends forward of the rim of the vessel. At the lower right side of the arrangement from this angle you can see a smaller, less developed flower spike. I placed this spike toward the rear because it is visible when walking across the room.

 

Here is the front-on view. I used some additional branch material that I had not used last week to create a space between two tall lines. This seemed a good way to present the single large spike in what is essentially a vertical ikebana arrangement.

The unusual black ceramic vessel comes from Seto City, a famous old pottery town east of Nagoya in Aichi Prefecture.

Greetings from Christopher

23rd August 2023

BARK and BANKSIA PRAEMORSA

This week, I gave my Torquay students the exercise of making an ikebana using pine and any other material.

Coralie used two of the Three Friends of Winter; in this case Bamboo and Pine, no Plum Blossom. The red artificial material (plastic-coated wire) had a structural as well as decorative function, as it helped secure the pine in position.

Lyn arranged curving stems of African flag Chasmanthe floribunda, in a suiban. She then added a small mass of Radiata pine Pinus radiata, at the base of the ikebana.

Pamela used pine, possibly Himalayan cedar Cedrus deodara. The dead branch on the right front is the same material, but was encrusted with pale green lichen. For colour contrast Pamela added an unidentified Acacia.

Last Tuesday the AGM of Ikebana International Melbourne was held. As is customary practice, the Heads of various Ikebana Schools in Victoria gave a simultaneous demonstration of their work. Each Head of School then spoke about the significance of their ikebana.

As the Director of the Sogetsu School of Ikebana, Victorian Branch, Aileen Clarke made an ikebana using Mountain Pine Pinus mugo and Camellia "Brushfields yellow".

This is Aileen's completed arrangement. When talking about her ikebana, for which she used three black metal vessels, Aileen told the members that next year is the 100th anniversary of the Sogetsu School's founding by Sofu Teshigahara. There is a coded message here!

The members attending the meeting were asked to complete an "ikebana of your own choice".

This is my ikebana, for which I had chosen bark as my principal material. Over some months I had noticed this large single piece of bark caught up in a tree, on our regular walk along the creek to the cricket oval. During the previous week, I realised that the bark had flattened out following some heavy rain. This change revealed more of the inner surface, which is a warm brown. The upper surface of the bark is a light mottled grey with a fairly smooth texture. These characteristics particularly appealed to me. I bought some yellow Banksia praemorsa to contrast with the bark and add the freshness of living material. The sweeping curve of the bark when arranged in this curving vessel was able to produce an overall continuous "S" curve.  

I reset the ikebana when I came home and found, in the process, that it worked better in this opposite orientation. It is the angle that is seen when coming into the living room from the front entrance.

This is the view straight on. 

Recently, I had the wide shelf made for the wall where our gas heater used to stand prior to the replacement of our colourbond roof in July (winter!) last year.

I am really pleased to now have a blank wall against which I will be able to place more spreading ikebana arrangements.

Greetings from Christopher

15th August 2026

JAPONICA (CHAENOMELES) and NARCISSUS

Last weekend, Hiroshima Peace Day was commemorated by the annual service held at St Paul's Cathedral in Melbourne. This year it was the turn of the Victorian Branch of the Sogetsu School to create a large scale ikebana arrangement for the service.

The design and installation of the ikebana was by Aileen Clarke, the Director of the Sogetsu School of Ikebana Victorian Branch, assisted by Karen Thode.

As I made my way to the cathedral, my attention was caught by these two Rainbow Lorrikeets. At first I thought that they were feeding chicks. However, after a short while, it was apparent that they were enlarging a shallow hole where a large branch had been removed some years before. Presumably, the birds were doing this to use the enlarged hollow for nesting. 

In my Melbourne class I had set the exercise of making an ikebana using bare, woody branches and Camellias. 

Aileen used Coastal Tea Tree as the principal material from which she had stripped off the many finer side branches to reveal its twisting lines. In a large black vessel she set some stems of pink Camellias as a fresh flower contrast.

Marcia arranged some thick rough bark as her woody material and added stems of white Camellias projecting through the holes in the side and top of the cylindrical vase.

Jacqueline arranged a long piece of dry branching wood with a sinuous curving line. It was fixed around the outside of the disk-shaped black vase into which she arranged long stems of Camellia with pink flowers.

My ikebana this week is a return to the winter-flowering red Japonica, Chaenomeles, which is still looking beautiful in the garden.

I have arranged two branching stems of the material, which I found surprisingly hard to photograph because the branches radiated in all directions. As a result I have taken the photograph from a rather high angle. Low in the middle of the ikebana are two small masses of white Narcissus nestling between two Arum lily Zantedeschia aethiopica, leaves.

The vase is by the Victorian ceramicist Owen Rye.

Click on the following link to the Sogetsu School of Ikebana Victorian Branch workshop I mentioned last week on the theme,  "A Composition Expressing Movement"

Greetings from Christopher
9th August 2026 

EXPLODING FIREWORKS

Last week I set my Torquay and Geelong students the task of making an ikebana "Incorporating Narcissus".

Coralie arranged Jonquils Narcissus jonquilla from her garden in a naturalistic style, adding small shield-shaped leaves at their base. The Narcissus were set in two groups with a space between and the narrow suiban oriented away from the viewer to provide depth.

Kerryn arranged her materials in a contemporary style using reeds to create three large triangular shapes with a small bunch of cut-off reeds radiating upward. Her Narcissus were set to create an elevated curving line of flowers.

Pamela arranged her Narcissus rising up through a horizontal mass of dark, Broad hop bush leaves Dodonaea viscosa.

In my Geelong class...

...Maureen arranged her Daffodils asymmetrically between two branches of an unidentified, narrow-leafed Acacia.

Ellie created a mass using a variety of Narcissus flowers which were set between two large bare branches with lichen, that were set in a spherical vessel.

Maree created a mass of Narcissus flowers rising in an irregular form from a slate vessel. The vertical form was emphasised by the addition of two Narcissus leaves that were bent into triangular shapes on the right side.

My ikebana was made for the Victorian Sogetsu Branch workshop that was held last Monday. It is a re-working of an arrangement I made early last year. The theme of the workshop was to make an ikebana "Expressing a movement". I cut a number of stems from the Umbrella grass I have growing in a large tub in the conservatory. The colour of the stems varied from green through yellow to a dry brown, and they were cut to different lengths. The stems are arranged radially in an asymmetric design set in a tapering white vase. I then have added bright red Carnations in the centre of the design, most of which were still in bud. The movement I was wanting to capture was the 'exploding' movement of fireworks in the night sky.

The vessel is by the Victorian ceramic artist Arnaud Barraud

Greetings from Christopher
2nd August 2026