Iris ‘Katharine Hodgkin’, A Dwarf Winter Iris With Stripes
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”
Blue Iris With A Fake Beard
A type of flower that may have beards, falls, flounces, horns, laminata, standards, signals and ruffles has to be accorded respect. Having said that, some of you might observe this ‘ordinary’ blue iris is lacking some of the twiddly bits its fancier bearded cousins can proudly display.
You might agree with me that the sunlight dancing on its upper petals and its clear, veined beelines left little to be desired: that the simple iris need not aspire to anything more. Continue reading “Blue Iris With A Fake Beard”
Winter Walk Around Bodnant Garden in Wales
Only last week I was bemoaning the lack of a Tardis to transport me to a snow-covered Bodnant Garden, near Tal-y-Cafn, Conwy, Wales. The universe did not send me a Tardis, but it did the next best thing. A friend asked us to check out the place his family came from – Dolgellau – and Bodnant just happened to be on our way home.
While the snow in the garden had long gone, heavy white shawls on the Snowdonia mountain range opposite gave Bodnant a wintry feeling. The 130 acres of garden give plenty of scope for walking: you really need some form of season ticket* to make the most of it all. Continue reading “Winter Walk Around Bodnant Garden in Wales”
Macro Monday: Iris With Ferns
These plant bedfellows seem to embody contrasts and echoes. Both are linear, with some symmetry, but neither are rigidly so. I get the feeling a mathematician might find reverie here. Curves, curls – wobbles, even – add complexity and soften any harshness. Someone or something has taken a chunk out of one iris petal, but the lines and colours are so hypnotic, we hardly notice it. Continue reading “Macro Monday: Iris With Ferns”
Iris Reticulata, The Bold And The Bedraggled
Blue and white striped irises are especially lovely, their colour accentuated by a blue pot. I would have guessed these are ‘Katharine Hodgkin’, but they lack the characteristic yellow that suffuses the lip of the lower petals. In compensation, the tips of the crest-like upper petals have artistic streaks of delft blue. Continue reading “Iris Reticulata, The Bold And The Bedraggled”
Wordless Wednesday: Purple and White Bearded Iris
Susan Rushton 