Feb 6 2017

Shohin displays at Noelanders Trophy and EBA 2017

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Jan 18 2017

World Bonsai Convention Coming Soon

The 8^th World Bonsai Convention will take place on April 27-30, 2017 in Saitama City, Japan. Saitama City is the new name for Omiya, famous for high quality bonsai gardens. This promises to be the finest and largest bonsai convention to date, anywhere. The World Bonsai Friendship Federation has been holding conventions since 1989, the first in Japan. Since then the convention held every four years has been held in the United States, Korea, Europe and Puerto Rico.

more-buds maple

Top Japanese bonsai artists will be demonstrating including: Masahiko Kimura, Hiroshi Takeyama, Kunio Kobayashi, Shinji Suzuki, Minoru Akiyama, Shigeo Isobe, Chikaru Imai, Taiga Urushibata, Kenji Oshima, Isao Omachi, Takashi Sakurai, Masayuji Fujikawa and Mitsuo Matsuda. Additionally international bonsai artists from each region of the World Bonsai Friendship Federation will also demonstrate: Werner Bush, Hannes Fritz, Jyoti & Ninkunj Parekh, Zao Quingquan, Mike Siow, Lindsay Bebb, Bjorn Bjorholm and Juan Andrade. That’s a…

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Jan 13 2017

Iwasaki Japanese White Pine

I posted on this last week but I wanted to revisit the tree here and get all the photos in one place. As stated, this tree was part of the Iwasaki Collection in Japan. I have pinched Peter’s text from his Facebook page explaining a little about how he came to have the trees.

Last May I took a very short trip to Japan as I was invited by Mr. Morimae of S-Cube Bonsai to have a sneak preview of the sale of the Iwasaki Collection.
As you may or may not be aware, Mr. Iwasaki was one of the premier collectors of bonsai in Japan over the last fifty years and he amassed a huge collection. He passed away several years ago and after lots of issues were resolved the collection was put up for sale and it was purchased by S-Cube

Due to my long standing relationship with Mr. Morimae, he let me get into the collection before 95% of the Japanese Bonsai world, let alone anybody from outside of Japan. As a result I got to choose a number of very special trees for a number of clients as well as some for myself to sell or style them and keep until someone wanted them. Finally, they got back here after a long process of quarantine. As they are trees with history and pedigree, some of them will be for sale, some of them not. There are a couple that I want to restyle this year but most of them are suffering a little from the importation and there are a few blind buds and branches so major work will wait until next year.

What you can’t tell so easily from the photos is the depth of character in the bark, the struggle these trees have been through giving them genuine old school bonsai flavour. These aren’t average pines which have been grown quickly and made to look pretty, these have age, character and class.
There are another bunch of trees that didn’t make it into the van this time but I should have them by the end of the week, as well as some non Iwasaki collection pines.
As with most of the trees that I put up, 95% of them are for sale but not to somebody I do not trust to look after them and not until I am 100% happy with their health.

On arrival at Peter’s last week I was given the task of clearing out the dead twigs and branches on this tree. Some had been lost during quarantine perhaps due to the fact that they were over due a repot and maybe watering was difficult to get right. Peter has turned the health around and there were many strong shoots on the tree.

This is it as I started.

Here after I cleared out the majority of the dead branches. Some left for jin as required.

Peter then informed me that I would be working on this tree for the first few days. A great honour to be trusted with the work on such a tree. My first job was to go through the tree removing shoots that were too strong, mostly towards the apex and then do some bud thinning. This is it before.

And after that process.

I then worked my way up the tree wiring each branch after discussion with Peter. So many little tips were given during this process. Information on JWP, wiring, branch placement, health etc. Below is the tree as we finished the work. This was not styled to look it best now, but shaped for the health of the weaker lower branches and gaining better structure in the next 5 years. A new front was selected due to brach removal but Peter was keen to point out that it must look good from all angles and we constantly spun the tree during the whole styling process.

Final tweaks

Structure from underneath.

A happy me, tired but happy 🙂

Covetous eyes…

Check out the video clip…

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Jan 8 2017

What Day Is It?

This week has been flat out so far with bonsai learning, I can’t even remember what day it is! I say learning as opposed to styling for a reason. Yes, trees have been styled but always with a view to what is best for them in both health and future development. This isn’t a workshop were you bring a tree to be completed, this is about making better bonsai. I can’t stress enough that Peter really cares about the trees first. Benches full of material of all types but each is being progressed with a plan, not just sitting for sale.

Yesterday was mostly about deciduous trees with Portuguese Oak , Maples, Japanese Apricot, all getting some work. A little carving was in order and a lot of discussion about how to develop the best tree for the future and using different techniques to achieve this.

Below are some of the trees in various states of work. Not all my work I’ll add, Steve, my new American friend, has been hard at it too.

We spent some time studying images of trees in books, in particular Japanese apricot, and seeing what the great ones look like. Even art work depicting the tree shows how they grow in nature. We then looked to emulate that when working the tree, always looking to the future.

We’ve now moved on to look at Taxus with some Yamadori trees being brought into the studio for discussion and work. Again it’s not a styling but the step by step work that needs to be done to create healthy trees with growth in the right places to create quality bonsai. Work on these continues…

In the photo Peter is looking for an older shot of the tree to show us, not browsing on Facebook 🙂

More as I get time to share.

Jan 8 2017

Japanese White Pine

My first tree completed in my week with Peter Warren. This Japanese White Pine had recovered from its time in quarantine where sadly it had lost a few branches. My task initially was to clear out any of the dead twigs and branches and then remove any strong growth in the upper portion of the tree.

That done I was given the task of wiring out the tree in a way that was sympathitic to the needs of the tree. Helping it regain vigour by opening out the branches for good light and balancing the density of the foliage between the vigorous areas and the weaker lower branches. With Peter’s guidance I learned a lot from this tree.It’s that last 10% of tweaking that makes all the difference and is probably the hardest bit to get right for me. You think it’s right and then you see a Japanese trained professional tweak it! With some good pointers and corrections I think it turned out well.

Jan 6 2017

Busy Busy…

Day 2 at Saruyama Towers and it’s flat out in the workshop since first thing this morning. Some great and extremely varied tunes on the go, punk being a little more than I needed! Undertones from home is proving a hit. A great atmosphere to work in and a great spot to take the odd wander into the garden. The cold snap seems to have passed now. It’s raining.

Peters own personal root stand!

Jan 5 2017

Monkey Mountain

Early start and a short flight to London to stay with Mr Warren.

Put straight to work on a very nice Japanese White Pine from the Iwasaki collection.

More on this later in the week. A cold day but some low winter sun made for a nice look around the trees.

Looking forward to what tomorrow brings….

Jan 2 2017

The story of the Shimpaku Juniper

Dec 16 2016

Korean Hornbeam

My Korean Hornbeam showing the change from Autumn into Winter.

Before trimming.

After trimming.

And in Winter image after dewiring.

Dec 14 2016

winter workshop december ’16

Sally's Bridge Bonsai

Last weekend Mark hosted a Munster Bonsai Club workshop with Ian Young and Phil Donnelly. I could only take part on the Saturday although the lads kept things rolling on Sunday.