Portland Hipstomatic

My biggest regret this week? While on my recent tour of Portland I failed to get a photo of a topiary that was actually spray painted, you will have to use your imagination. It was however a good chance for me to test out my new wide angle lens on my iphone combined with the hipstomatic app it was quite fun.

Easy Topiary

As many of you know, I may be a topiary admirer, but I don't really know that much about how they are actually made. That has changed a little now thanks to a recent article "Easy Topiary for the Garden" over at South End Seattle blog. Check it out!

ORDO AB CHAO

I've been thinking of the Latin phrase "ORDO AB CHAO" meaning ORDER OUT OF CHAOS. It is something that we all do. Born into a crazy world we stretch our brains to make sense of a senseless world, we form languages and societies, create myths and even wars in search of our place in the universe. During a difficult period in his life ground-breaking pshycologist Carl Jung devoted much of his time investigating the nature of the unconscious, Jung frequently painted or drew mandalas, but only learned to understand the mandala symbology many years later. Jung believed that his mandalas were “cryptograms” of the state of the self as it was on the day the mandala was created. He also believed that mandalas appear in connection with dreams, chaotic psychic states of disorientation or panic as they did in Jung’s own life, and that a function of the mandalas is to bring order out of chaos.
I've decided that there is something calming and centering about taking a 'natural' shaped plant and making it into something entirely new, and perhaps recognizable and orderly.

Plant Amnesty can kiss my Bonsai!

Okay, it's one thing if you don't like Beacon Hill's funky shrubbery, but its a whole different issue when you refer to it as being 'goofy' as Cass Turnbull seems to have done in today's Seattle Times article on Plant Amnesty. I can certainly appreciate wanting to protect plants from senseless mutilation but Plant Amnesty seems to have nominated themselves the arbiters of taste with comments like "When the inherent beauty of a plant is compromised, it's painful for those of us who know what it should look like,"
Who gave Plant Amnesty the authority to decided what plants should look like? They have a Shear Madness photo section on their blog and I actually think that some of the photos are amazing and I find their comments to be culturally insensitive.

That's why we are introducing a new T-Shirt! Let Plant Amnesty know what you think of their mission and show your Beacon Hill pride at the same time! All proceeds go towards Beacon Arts celebrating creativity in all its forms on Beacon Hill.

Bonsai visits Annoying Orange

I couldn't resist posting a talking bonsai!

BeHi Bonsai in the Seattle Times

Stop holding your breath, the Seattle Times article on BeHi Bonsai is out now! Go read it! Here it is!

Thanks Val Easton for recognizing our neighborhoods unique contributions. This has already opened a flood gate of information so I will be posting more soon.