26th October, 2020

 

Hippeastrums and found, dry daisy plant in lacquered, asymmetric suiban

Hello all,

Yes, more hippeastrums. For many years I have been only modestly successful with these plants but this year I gave them the attention they deserved, at the right time and they have rewarded me in spades. I have many more buds to open. I'm looking forward to some colours other than red.

My Louisiana iris are looking quite lovely. Snails usually get to my flowers because I'm reluctant to use snail bait but, I confess, I used some this year with the result being more and healthier flowers.

Front view of traditional arrangement of iris

Side view showing the placement of the stems
and leaves

Spuria iris, mollis azalea and kiwi vine

Our good friends, Nick and Olga have recently purchased a new property on which they will build their new home. The existing house will be demolished as well as the established but neglected garden. At Olga's suggestion, we had planned to organise a class excursion to the property to help ourselves to the abundant material before the excavators arrived. Unfortunately, covid put paid to that. Work is about to start, so I went on my own and collected materials that I don't have in my garden. I dedicate the arrangements, below, to Olga.

Olga's wisteria and my Altissimo roses. It might be hard to believe that
it took me over an hour to create this arrangement.

Flowers from a succulent, whose name
I don't know

Ginger seed heads and colourful geranium
leaves. The strelitzia is from my garden

Close up of geranium leaves

I was very taken by the colours of this particular geranium and have taken cuttings to strike.

More of the geranium and my mollis azalea in a wall arrangement.

In the next arrangement I used a very big container made by Graham Wilke, which normally sits in the bathroom because it is so big and precious. When I cut these giant aeoniums from Olga's I struggled to find an appropriate container, so put them aside. It was only when I was cleaning the bathroom that I remembered I had this one and had to get Sam to bring it down for me. Two of the lessons in our book 3 are about paying attention to the colour and the shape of the container. I'm satisfied that this combination works well on both counts.

And while I'm on the subject of containers, apart from the colour and the shape, we should, also, pay attention to the style. Some very plain containers can be successfully used for both naturalistic and modern arrangements. However, there are many that have a distinct style, such as rustic looking ones for naturalistic and sleek, bold ones for more modern.

So, thank you Olga. I hope you enjoy these photos of my arrangements as much as I have enjoyed making them.

Bye for now,

Emily