Sesame Street Toys

Kermit, Elmo, Ernie, Oscar the Grouch toys on a patterned chair

HeyJude is asking to see pattern used as a background in this week’s 2020 Photo Challenge. She adds:

Don’t have your subject too large in the frame or it will detract from the pattern. And consider whether the patterned background adds or takes away the impact of the subject.

The pattern reflects the zaniness of the characters. It’s bright and bold, but could we imagine Sesame Street any other way? Continue reading “Sesame Street Toys”

Iris ‘Katharine Hodgkin’, A Dwarf Winter Iris With Stripes

Dwarf winter iris with blue stripes and spots on a yellow fall

Iris ‘Katharine Hodgkin’ has barely even ankle high flowers that are a muddy mix of pale blue, cream and yellow. It can be identified by the unusual colour, and the beautiful veins on the falls. Blue stripes radiate from a yellow blotch that is spotted blue. Three standards (upper petals) are striped and veined too.
Continue reading “Iris ‘Katharine Hodgkin’, A Dwarf Winter Iris With Stripes”

The Giant Houseplant Takeover: A Review With Pictures

Bath and shower in a tall room hung with plants
An outdoor bathroom, but indoors

RHS Garden Wisley’s houseplant exhibition is kooky and wry: an elaborate conceit. A Victorian house has been abandoned to the houseplants which, in the absence of humans, have made themselves at home.

Four-poster bed with colourful flowering bromeliads
Bromeliads fill the bed, trunk and leafy plants tumble down the walls

An abundance of greenery may convey a derelict feel as visitors enter, but it soon becomes clear that everything is carefully arranged and tended. We’re visiting the best-behaved invasive houseplants in the history of mankind. My own ‘triffid’ is much less mannerly. Continue reading “The Giant Houseplant Takeover: A Review With Pictures”