Hello all,

I was very saddened to hear of yet another loss to our little community in the recent passing of Brenda Thorpe, one of our founding members. Brenda contributed a lot to ikebana over the years but most especially during the time that our Ikebana International Group was exhibiting in Daimaru department store. We will miss her.

Julie Alston was another member, who passed away on 12th June 2013. As per her wishes, her funeral was a very private affair, which meant that none of us was able to attend. Recently, her family, very generously, made available to the ikebana community Julie's containers. Those of my students who bought containers and I, thought it would be a fitting tribute to Julie for each of us to do an arrangement in a container that once belonged to her. I believe she would have been happy to see the work that was done in her containers. 

 Janette Fonda

         Monstera leaves and Viburnam opulus          

Helen Novic
Loquats and succulent

Lucy Papas

Strelitzia leaves

                                                          Vicky Kalokathis

                                     Agapanthus leaves and geranium

Bredenia Raquel

Willow and spuria iris

Emily Karanikolopoulos

Stripped conifer, loquats and alstroemeria leaves

The branch that  I used in the above arrangement is the same
one I used in the arrangement on the left, which I did on 28th
August. It was still green when I stripped it to use again.







On the 30th October, I did a demonstration for The Floral Art Association of Victoria. Those of you who have read my last blog can be forgiven if you are a little confused because I then wrote about my demonstration for the Victorian Floral Art Association. They are, in fact, two different groups.

It was an East Meets West theme, with three senior floral artists demonstrating three very different but equally pleasing arrangements as set out below.

Barbara Maier

Norma Bathie

Janet Alesich

Then we enjoyed a delicious, east-meets-west supper followed by my ikebana demonstration of seven arrangements. My student, Nicole McDonald, was my very capable assistant for the evening, fetching and carrying materials and containers. For me, it was a very pleasant evening because I was doing what I love best in front of a very receptive and appreciative audience.

Again, I recreated my arrangements at home for the purpose of photographing them against a blank background, which would have been impossible on the night of the demonstration.

Using two containers - a glass decanter inside a ceramic bowl with two holes. Hippeastrum, watsonia and nandina flowers

Birds nest fern and spuria iris

A single philodendron leaf

An experiment with cutting and re-joining this palm spade. Strelitzia and alstroemeria leaves

Quintessential ikebana - a flag iris arrangement

Stripped wisteria vines and spuria iris

Pine, altissimo roses, iceberg roses and mizuhiki

(A little early for Christmas but I couldn't resist)