‘Up close and personal’

It’s no coincidence that we find flowers the most beautiful part of a plant, the whole point of them is to be attractive, by their shape, colour and perfume. It is just about sex after all, their job is to get their pollinators to them by any means available and we find them irresistible too.

From breeding plants together to create ever bigger, brighter longer lasting blossoms to recording them in every possible way, we’ve endeavoured to make the most of their all too fleeting charms to keep them blooming for longer and record them for posterity.

From the Elizabethan ladies at their needlework and the Victorian amateur naturalist with his magnifying glass and watercolours to me and my daughter with our digital cameras competing for the best close up shots of my garden’s flowers, we’ve always felt the need to capture the moment, the peak of perfection of these most transient of beauties.

As a designer I spend much of my time exploring how colours, forms and shapes contrast or combine together, the composition of the whole picture being of more importance than the individual snapshots, but when it comes to flowers I’m just as seduced by them as anyone.

Each single flower is unique, it demands our full attention and the closer we look the more we see there is to appreciate. The subtleties and shadings of translucent colours, the variety of shapes as individual petals fuse or separate and just a sniff of the scent, in one intake of breath, can take us back years to a sun filled happy childhood and granny’s garden.

 

Of all the elements which combine to make a garden, flowers have always had the most meaning to us, that’s why this month when so many are at their most glorious and abundant we should take the time and trouble to really take a good look and appreciate our wild and garden flowers. 

Make the most of it, get out there, up close and personal.