It is difficult to leave. Outdoors there are mountains and greenery and trains on elevated tracks.
.
All content included on this site such as text, graphics and images is protected by U.S and international copyright law.
The compilation of all content on this site is the exclusive property of the site copyright holder.
Kiku at the New York Botanical Gardens
Tuesday, 12 November 2024
I'm not certain how much time was spent in the holiday train show. There's so much to see - trains, buildings, details on the buildings. And of course there are also plants, both permaent inhabitants of the Haupt Conservatory and also transients installed to enhance the train show. But - as always at the New York Botanical Garden - there's more. I'm fortunate that today's visit for the media preview of the train show has an overlap with another event. The display of Japanese kiku, meticulously trained chrysanthemums, opened on November 2nd and will close barely two weeks later.
It is difficult to leave. Outdoors there are mountains and greenery and trains on elevated tracks.
Our all-garden pass includes use of the trams. Especially helpful today as the Bourke-Sullivan Display House where the kiku are on display is on the far side of the grounds. We walk towards the garden shop for the most convenient tram stop, slowing down to catch a glimpse of the Nancy Bryan Luce Herb Garden as we pass by.
The main tram stop is across from the reflecting pool. Only it is now carpeted with greenery
image courtesy Wm P Woodall, all rights reserved
and a seasonal display of multiple woven trees and a couple of spheres. FYI, there are 8 tram stops,
a recorded narration of what we are quietly passing by. And the complete circuit takes 20 minutes.
Having looped around with a brief pause here and there - library, rose garden -
we arrive at the Nolen Greenhouses and its Bourke-Sullivan Display House.
A brief detour from kiku. But not from chrysanthemums.
We enjoy chrysanthemums. Not the classical Japanese kiku
but rather as simple blobs of seasonal color in a pot.
Chrysanthemums are lovely in the garden too, as revealed
several years ago by a pairing at NYBG one autumn day.
Sunshine from flowers and foliage. A mass of warm orange daisies,
chrysanthemums just tinged with red, with golden Lindera above them.
Now, back to the Bourke-Sullivan Display House and its display of kiku.
There is a grouping of yellow chrysanthemums. But what a diversity - daisies, pompoms, an explosion of threadlike petals.
.
.
Variations on a theme: selections of rose with yellow, red with white around a central disc, and red and yellow crested.
However these are familiar both in form and how they are being grown. Basic. In a pot. But wait, because there is more.
Chrysanthemums with enormous petals which give an individual flower the appearance of a platter.
A plant trained to a single stem as a standard, braced
with a rod to support the sphere of flowers balanced on top.
Kengai, overhanging cliff style, features a cascade of flowers on a single stem.
When it is large enough, each plant was moved to a larger pot and tied to a boat-shaped, horizontal frame of wire mesh. Branches are precisely woven through the mesh and tied in place so that the frame will become covered with hundreds of small flowers. When the buds start to open, the frame is tilted down like a cascade.
There are rules for the kiku, precise details of what and how and how many flowers.
Shino-tsukuri, driving rain, must be created from Edo chrysanthemums that mimic
the spattering of hard rain. Twenty-seven flowers in a tiled circle of precise rows.
Or this ozukuri, stunning thousand blossom. (Actually, if you want to count it is 200 flowers.) O.K., you say, must be many plants in that sekidai, large wooden planter. Nope. It is one plant. That's right, just ONE plant, raised from a cutting and meticulously trained for 11 months.
.
images copyright Wm P Woodall, all rights reserved
Look carefully at the second image. The single pale brown stem may just be seen in the center.
Here's how it was done. Not something that is easy to do without training, equipment, and attention to detail.
What's on display today is just half of the chrysanthemums prepared for the kiku display. One set is needed for the first week, another for the second week. And then some extras as backup for those accidents and disasters that happen in any garden. So perhaps next fall when you are off somewhere shopping and see those blobs of color in a pot, appreciate them for their simplicity and remember the dedication that brings the kiku display to the New York Botanical Garden
Back to November
Back to the main Diary Page