For over 3 years running, I've been making flower arrangements for my building lobby, the Eagle Warehouse.

The best part of this job is having this audience of over 100
people that have stayed with me. Their criticisms and compliments have helped me grow and improve. They are a very diverse and opinionated group, many of whom are artists, architects and designers. Some like my minimal, classic ikebana designs and others prefer lusher, more western arrangements with lots of flowers. So I get to experiment and
challenge myself to come up with different designs every week

This arrangement got me a handwritten note from Apt 4G:
"This is the most exquisite and artistic flower arrangement
I have ever seen!!!!"

I feel so happy and lucky.

calla lilies, hydrangea, ruskus, mini crabapple branches

I picked up these vine balls at a yard sale, found this funky container made of water hyacinth bark at the Brooklyn Flea. My friend Mary gave me a bunch of water hyacinth seeds and reeds from Thailand.
The bamboo rods I'd saved from an old tropical arrangement.
Wa la: Instant arrangement!
Not your mother's ikebana arrangement, but i think my sensei would be ok with it---i kinda recall her saying that her sensei, the Sogetsu School founder, used to say that anyone can make ikebana with anything, anywhere, anyhow. How do you like my Anywho piece?

Driftwood

Driftwood can add so much pizazzzz to ikebana!

Aren't these
amazing?
I saw these
on my cross-
country road
trip this summer. Oh
I wanted sooo badly to bring them home with me, but I
would've gotten arrested because a) they were in a national forest, and b) they were HUGE. I would've needed a semi to lug these babies home to my tiny bkln apt, and then c) my husband and dog would have to move out....[sigh]. So, over to you...next time you're in Yellowstone and you have more guts and a bigger truck, be my guest---just promise me you'll let me borrow one of them now and then, ok?

Viburnum branches + berries, smoketree leaves.

My father gave me this unusual ceramic vase. He bought it in Taiwan from an old ikenobo master, who said he hardly ever used it since he got it in Japan in the 70's, and was happy to sell it.
I don't know why because it had me at hello. Maybe it was the vivid tangerine color reminiscent of that groovy era? Or its unique geometry: square but elegantly curved on one side with a peekaboo window, and flat on the other with a large full-moon-like opening.
I am learning that unique vases like this one are very demanding. Focal points in of themselves, they seem to compete with any flowers I tried to add. Finally, I went with no flower--- just branches, berries and leaves.
Maybe that's why its original owner, who was a florist now, was willing to part with it?

Brooklyn jellyfish ballet

Aren't these jellyfishes mesmerizing? I couldn't take my eyes off them at the Aquarium on Brooklyn's Coney Island. I wanted to take them home with me but didn't want to get arrested, so instead I made this video. I love their dreamy, rhythmic choreography and tantalizing display of feathery, ribbon-like tentacles. I think I"m so attracted to them because they're flower-like. They make me want to make my flower arrangements more rhythmically beautiful...my thoughts go to a lotus pond in Taiwan, where a summer breeze stirred the lotus flowers to sway and dance. It was a spectacularly magical moment: another one of nature's perfectly choreographied ballets. [note: be sure to mute the audio before playing]

Mazezashi=Mixed composition of 5 or more materials.

There was an abundance of beautiful, richly colorful wildflowers at class today. It was a wonderful opportunity to try my hand at a mazezashi freestyle arrangement. It wasn't easy. With so many materials to incorporate, I found it difficult to carve out some negative space. The overall effect, that of a lush summer field, wild and free, beckoning you to come frolic within. If I were a bumblebee, I'd think I died and went to heaven there... Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!!!!!!

Tenri Gallery NY 2010 Sogetsu Show

Did you see the recent Sogetsu NY exhibition at the Tenri Gallery?
Here are 2 arrangements from the show, by A.Sano and N.Kawana, respectively.
I was struck by their bold geometric compositions.
Quite unique, aren't they?
I kept staring at them. I was stumped by a couple of questions. 1) is a good ikebana arrangement necessarily pretty ? 2) when is it considered going too far when organic materials are manipulated to look not so organic any more? I don't know, do you?
Good art stimulates, stretches the imagination, or makes one stop and think---that I do know.

To view more arrangements from the show, go to
the upper right "Page" section and click "Tenri".

It is in the 90's and sweltering. This arrangement I made for the Eagle Warehouse lobby reflects the hot and crazy concrete jungle that is our city this Memorial Weekend.
Ginger flowers, Cana leaves, dried palm seed pods (a gift from my sister Shirley's real jungle garden on the Big Island of Hawaii), and wild vines foraged from a parking lot here in Brooklyn. I think it's kind of savagely beautiful, don't you?

Frienship Through Flowers

"anybody can do ikebana anytime, anywhere, with anything"---Sofu Teshigahara, Founder of Sogetsu

It was in this spirit that fellow Ikebana International Board members and I spent the day in Bedford-Stuyvesant yesterday to teach 30 boys and girls how to arrange flowers. I must admit I was a bit intimidated at first, what with all the negative press associated with Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy neighborhood. Actually, the kids were a joy to work with. They were well behaved, respectful of us and the flowers, and very enthusiastic---even the boys. Arent' they cute, looking so proud of their creations? I was proud too, to be living up to our organization's motto: "Friendship through Flowers".

Cherry blossoms, your season is not over---
Do your petals start to fall
Because the love of your admirers is now at its height? ---anonymous


This past weekend was the annual Cherry Blossom Festival at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Can you believe there was not a single cherry blossom left on any of their trees? Thanks to the freaky 90-degree weather of early spring! So, I bought cherry blossom branches that had been refridgerated and forced them open for use in our annual exhibit there. Itching to do something a bit creative, I used a clear vase and dropped some food coloring into the water. I thought the aqua-colored water made for a refreshing contrast to all the pinkness and rendered a unique twist to an otherwise totally traditional arrangement.

Cymbidium orchids, anthariums, dogwood, white and umbrella pine, moss, brasilia,pom poms.
Exhibit at Ikebana International's Annual Show in the lobby of Price Waterhouse's headquarter.
Being my first attempt at a large arrangement, I was lucky to have a co-creator (Maye Smith-Beauchamp) and a mentor (Mel Furukawa), making the project more afforadable and fun. One of the requirements was that it had to be viewable at all angles. Which view do you like: front or back?

dancing spirea

Spirea is commonly called 'bridal wreath". Isn't it a perfect name? Tiny, dainty white flowers dot slender, arching shoots. Swaying gracefully to the gentlest of spring breezes, they seem to say, blushingly and coyly, "Won't you dance with me?"

Yesterday was Good Friday. I always wonder, what's good about it?

I chose a flowering dogwood to commemorate the day, because it is said that the 4 reddish marks on the tips of the flowers represent Christ's blood on his hands and feet. Kind of morbid, but the Granny Smith apple-green color of these flowers are so refreshingly pretty, it hardly matters. Complementing them are tiny daffodils, giant tulips and ruskus leaves. The tulips are so huge, I wonder if they used steroids? I opened up two of the tulips manually, just for fun. They look like completely different flowers, don't they? Do you like tulips closed or open?

Pine is revered in the East as the noblest of all evergreens. In Japan the pine stands for longevity, steadfastness and perseverance. "Matsu", the Japanese word for pine is a homonym of "wait", reinforcing the steadfastness symbolism.Also since pine needles are typically depicted as two needles joined at the base, Japanese wedding florals will often include pine.Being such an auspicious symbol, no wonder the pine is ubiquitous in Asian gardens, art and culture.

In this arrangement I chose pink Lilies to serve as a counterpoint to the powerful statement made by the two pine branches. In the end, it felt like a mating dance to me, with a great display of strutting gestures and coquettish charms.

Living Sculpture...

...is how someone once described Ikebana.
Art in 3-D with live plants and flowers as sculpting medium.

This simple arrangement is composed of just 2 elements:
agapanthus flowers and New Zealand flax leaves. I was going for something that felt airy and open---like an atrium. Yet, as I was finishing it, I wondered if there was too much open space. So I tried more flowers, but even adding one made it feel cluttered.

My sensei liked it and said, once again, "the simplest arrangements are the most difficult". Today's lesson was "Leave well enough alone" The trick: when is it good enough?

Today was a precious day: filled with sunshine, friendship and flowers at one of my favorite places, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Signs of spring were everywhere there. Like these clusters of cheerful crocuses. Imagine a huge field carpeted with these delightful flowers, birds chirping, and children gleefully rolling down grassy slopes. If it weren't for our seemingly interminable, blustery NY winters, would we relish such days as much?

"Ya can't please all da people all da time", as the saying goes.

But for the last 3 years, I've been trying to do just that, as the florist for the Eagle Warehouse, a turn-of-the-century building with 85 cooperative apartments. The residents reflect the wide variety of units within: Not a single one identical. So, every week, I try to offer a different kind of arrangement.

Being Brooklynites, most of them are not shy. I get feedback, good and bad. I've even gotten love letters (in the first year when my identity was kept anonymous)!
It has been a great laboratory for experimentation, and I feel very lucky to be retained by them.

This week's arrangement was done for the lavender lovers, a pair of sweet ladies on the third floor. Gladiolus, Leucanthos, and Scottish heather in vintage Japanese rattan baskets.

Ultimate Zen

People often ask me, what is the essential idea behind Ikebana? I think what sets it apart from other styles of flower arranging, say Western style, is the point of view that although flowers and plants are in perfect shape in their natural environment, there are excess parts. So, removing the unnecessary parts is essential to the art of ikebana.

The trick, always, is to know just what to remove and how much. A key to that knowledge is practice.

Hence, this exercise in ultimate simplification: maximum expression possible by the minimum parts possible. In other words, I had to try to eliminate unnecessary parts to the ultimate so that, if any more is removed, the original materials can no longer be identified or what remains cannot be ikebana.

Did I succeed? Can you tell what kind of plant material I used?

Less is more.

This morning at class, I was in the mood to do something zen-like, so I chose this slim lavender-hued vase. It's opening is only 1/2 inch wide, so a makeshift "kenzan" out of crumpled up vines had to be used. After shaping the pussy willow branch just so, I had quite a nice line going. Cool. But then I found that no matter what I tried to add, it seemed to take away from the overall zen feeling. So leaving well enough alone, I sought out a second vase to complete the arrangement, using a few sprigs of heather and one gladiolus stalk (split into 5).

Sensei said it is often most difficult to do the most sparse arrangements. As usual, she was right.

Don't you just want to leave winter behind
and go loll under a nice palm tree on a sandy beach?

If you're like me and can't, the next best thing may be to surround yourself with some tropical flora.

I was lucky to be gifted these lush Philodendron bipinnatifidum leaves, roses and snapdragons from Mel. The lichen/moss-covered branches I foraged from the swampy woods of Virginia. The antique Japanese bamboo vase is a gift from my dad.

Now, all I need is a Mai-Tai and hammock!

With this arrangement I hoped to capture the blustery feeling of the big Nor'easter that's blown into NY, closing schools and roads, knocking down trees and power lines, and rendering most of us snowbound, once again.

These are red Siberian dogwood branches I'd saved from Christmastime. I was delighted to find them starting to bloom. And still quite flexible, I was able to bend and twist them. While doing so, tiny white petals came fluttering down, dusting my hair! Here I was, cozily indoors yet feeling... totally windswept.

Chinese New Year flowers @ Eagle Warehouse Lobby, Bkln

Cremola mums, Mandarin oranges, Camellia and Forsythia branches in a Chinese Lantern-style ceramic vase

Not your typical Chinese New Year flower arrangement, what without the usual riot of red and gold all over, right? But it does feature bright yellow (surrogate for gold=wealth)
and lots of oranges. Why oranges? Because they're trad-
itional symbols of fertility (containing lots of seeds), as well as the fact that the Chinese word for orange, "jweh dz", is a homonym for "bearing sons"---something so, so terribly valued in old China's patriarchal culture .
Funny that such traditions continue to endure wherever Chinese New Year is celebrated (which is pretty much everywhere in the world because there are so many Chinese people ;-) ---all in spite of global concerns of overpopulation and strides in feminist equality.
Whatever. These oranges are sweet, aren't they?

Look what I found: this is a picture I dug up today of an arrangement I made about 6 months before the one below. Yes, these are the actual, exact same birds nest leaves and kiwi vines---only they were totally fresh here! Even though they are different compositions, isn't it interesting to compare the overall feeling each conveys?

I like both of them equally, but as the creator of both, I am biased ;-)

Which do you relate more to?

Gallery Exhibit

[photo by Carol Dronsfield]
Last summer I visited my 94-year old dad, who lives in a Chinese senior home. I learned many, many life lessons during my stay there. One of them was "Age has its own Beauty". It was a remark gently whispered to me by one of the residents, upon observing my attempt to "refresh" a 2-day old flower arrangement of mine. It changed my mind about removing a leaf that was beginning to yellow with age.

So, for an exhibit at Nippon Gallery in New York last fall, I chose Bird's Nest Ferns that were aged over 3- 6 months. Notice their feathery edges, fading striations and gently curling shapes.

I think they give this arrangement a unique, soulful sensibility. Do you agree?