We spent an enjoyable morning with the little ones at the Japanese School of Halifax. We were happy to introduce ikebana to the little ones!
It was a great opportunity for the children to connect to a part of their cultural heritage even whilst they are very far from Japan. Everybody did a great job!
We are also conducting workshops for the older boys and girls. But this group is the cutest of them all! :-)
Thank you to everyone who visited our booth at Hal-Con!
You kept us very busy! :-)
We at the ikebana shop strive to introduce Japanese culture and aesthetics to you. Anime, manga and kawaii are very much part of it and so we are very thankful to the Hal-Con Sci-Fi/Fantasy Convention for the opportunity to be part of this great event!
Here are some of our favourite cosplays. We're sure we missed a lot more...maybe we'll see you next year!
Hanji, Levi & Eren from Attack On Titan
Asuna from Sword Art Online
Ninja! He had good moves!
Midorima from Kuroko no Baske
Jean from Attack On Titan
Princess Mononoke & Kaneki from Tokyo Ghoul
Ichigo Kurosaki from Bleach
Kirito from Sword Art Online
Totoro!
Once again, on one magical night, our shop was transformed into a little ikebana gallery.
It was hard work to put all the merchandise away and set the stage.
But it was harder work to design the arrangements! All worth it.
On October 18th, 2014, from 6 p.m. to midnight, we were there to show and explain ikebana.
We also served some cake to show our appreciation. :-)
Here are the work of Miyako and her students.
The outside installation was a collaborative effort by Miyako and Val Spencer. Hemlock greens, magnolia & willow branches, spray mums and bamboo.
The big willow branch was actually given to us by a friend last winter. She said her neighbour's tree had fallen in a storm. She thought we might like it so she hauled it all the way to our shop. That was probably a good 3 blocks away! Thank you Joan!
Left:: "Autumn Happiness" by Patti Vaison. Patti could not join us on Nocturne so she had prepared her arrangement in advance using dried material: Chinese lantern, cattails and eryngium. Glass beads on blue glass containers gave calming balance to the vivid orange!
Right: "Paintbrush" by Val Spencer. Anthurium and hosta stems. Now, you couldn't have guessed those "sticks" were from hosta, right? :-) A couple of sheets of square paper underneath may seem inconsequential but they complete the picture.
Left: "Moonlight" by Avril Yu. Stargazer lilies and alder branches. Like a bright moonlit night!
Right: "Kabu-Wake" (That's the style of arrangement having 2 "islands" in one moribana container) by Jean Henshall. Yellow roses and pincushion protea.
Left: Basic upright moribana by Randa Bdeir (L) and Abeer Sabanekh (R). Pink anastasias, alder branches and eryngium. The two friends' works had been done separately but came together perfectly as a pair!
Right: "No-Mind" by Miyako. Dendrobium, yellow mums, grape vine and Japanese rose branches. For this arrangement, Miyako said she wasn't thinking at all. Her hands just moved!
Left: "Discord" by Miyako. Silver Dollars, dried hydrangea and hemlock. We don't know what the branches are. We picked them up on the sidewalk after a storm had blown by! This arrangement went through countless iterations as if there were opposing forces pulling it back and forth.
Right: "Hope" by Miyako. Mountain ash branches, Japanese rose hips and craspedia. It looked like it just crested a steep peak!
Left: "Tall Gladiola" by Sydney Feng. Gladiola, cattail leaves and pine. The heavy vertical presence of the gladiola was contrasted by the light sprinkling of pine needles.
Right: "Dawning" by Val Spencer. Begonias and climbing hydrangea...and meticulously sculptured branches!
We thank everyone who came all the way to Quinpool to visit us...even as the bulk of Nocturne festivities were happening in downtown. We hope you enjoyed our little exhibit. Time flew by very quickly!
Thank you to the ikebana students who participated. We hope you also had an enriching experience. Everybody loved your work!
A more complete set of Nocturne images can be found on our flickr album.
September 28th was a beautiful Halifax Sunday afternoon. The organizers of Japanesque decided Mother Nature's offering of good weather was too good to pass and the event was moved to the gardens of The Oaks on the southern tip of the St. Mary's University campus.
Japanesque was co-organized by the Japanese Language and Culture Program, Department of Modern Languages and Classics of St. Mary's University and the Consulate General of Japan at Montreal, with the support of the Japan Foundation.
Festivities were opened with a taiko performance. That got everyone's attention!
The event was graced with the presence of Dr. David Gauthier, Vice President, Academic and Research at St. Mary's University and Mr. Tatsuo Arai, Consul General of Japan at Montreal.
Mr. Tatsuo Arai, Consul General of Japan at Montreal sharing a few words.
Shihobarai--the purification of the four directions.
Serene and graceful bugaku dance (Japanese court dance).
Chanoyu (tea ceremony) demonstrated by Dr. Alexandre Avdulov, coordinator of the Japanese Language and Culture Program at SMU.
Our very own, Miyako, creating ikebana arrangements.
We were lucky that it was not a windy day! All the arrangements stayed put. :-)
Matcha green tea was served. They made a LOT of bowls so everyone could enjoy tea in this peaceful setting.
Learning about calligraphy and Japanese paper inside the Oaks Mansion.
Miyako chatting with Consul General Arai.
Alexandre-sensei making tea late in the afternoon.
We hope you all enjoyed the afternoon of Japanesque. Till next time!
This past few days, if you've walked through the doors to enter the McNally Theatre at St. Mary's University in Halifax NS, this ikebana arrangement would have greeted you.
The arrangement was created as part of the Japanesque activity, celebrating Japanese culture. At the McNally Theatre, there were free screenings of two Japanese films last Saturday, Sep 27th.
Miyako and three of her advanced students--Jean, Patti, and Val--worked hard to put this together. That includes enduring the freezing cold working on the design in our garage! :-)
Other friends also contributed. The silver dollar medallions (top left of the photo) were a gift from Beverly. Every year, when she prunes her garden, she delivers silver dollar branches to us! Thank you, Beverly!
These tall branches were courtesy of our friend, Sheila. She graciously let us walk around her cottage and gather whatever branches we needed. See the action photo below! :-)
So, this is what an ikebanista will do just to get that perfect branch! :-)
We show our appreciation too!
And... here are the four ladies who made this possible. (L-R Jean, Patti, Val, and Miyako.) Thank you all for the wonderful work!
We'd like to thank St. Mary's University for kindly allowing us to use the space for this arrangement!
N.B. The date stamp on the last two photos say "09/27/2014" but in fact they prepared this on Sep 26th. The camera came from Japan and was still on the Japanese clock where the dateline had already been crossed! :-)
Halifax had a rare opportunity to view vintage meisen (銘仙) kimonos. The Anna Leonowens Gallery recently exhibited the kimono collection of Haruko Watanabe, a noted collector of Japanese antique and vintage textiles from Tokyo, Japan.
Many beautiful kimonos and haoris were on display.
What is immediately noticeable with the meisen kimonos is the patterns' disengagement from traditional kimono motifs of flowers, cranes, pine, etc. Indeed the meisen kimono shows very bold and vivid designs!
They are like pop art. Very refreshing, very modern.
Meisen silk became popular around the 1910's to the 1950's. The era of art deco!
The designs are adventurous and daring.
Some were mesmerizing too!
With the introduction of a new weaving technique called "hogushi-ori" (解し織) in the early 1900's, meisen silk became easier to produce and thus became affordable to more people.
“At the beginning, the warp is held by an interim weaving. The fabric is removed from the loom and a stencil is used to print the pattern. When the printing process is complete, the real weft is woven, while the interim weft is untied. This process is called “Hogushi”.
The defining characteristics of Hogushi fabric are its lightness and durability. Both sides of the fabric can be used. Due to the warp printing, the patterns are soft and blurred, despite the bold, vivid colours.”
There were also obi at the exhibit.
The meisen kimono remained popular until around the 1950's. After the war, fashion tastes shifted to more Western style clothing. Also, wool became popular. Sadly, by the 1960's, the meisen kimono had all but disappeared.
Thank you to the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (NSCAD), with special mention to faculty member, Nancy Price and retired professor, Naoko Furue, for making this exhibition possible.
The exhibit was also featured in the Chronicle Herald.
Sources:
September 27-28 is the weekend mini-festival of Japanese culture to be held at St. Mary's University in Halifax NS.
September 27th (Saturday) is movie night at the McNally Theatre. Entrance is free! Two Japanese movies will be shown:
6:00 p.m. 歓待 Kantai (Hospitalité) , 2010, 96 min, comedy.
8:00 p.m. ツナグ Tsunagu (Until The Break Of Dawn), 2012, 129 min, drama.
For a trailer with English subtitles, please click here. (Sorry, we could not embed the video in the blog post.)
September 28th (Sunday) is a day of cultural presentations including tea ceremony, bugaku performance (court dance & music), kyudo (Japanese archery), taiko (drums), calligraphy, washi (Japanese paper), incense, and of course, ikebana! Entrance is free. Venue is also the McNally Theatre.
We will be doing the ikebana part. :-) Hope to see you there!
The Japanesque event is co-organized by St. Mary's University and the Consulate General of Japan at Montreal, with the support of The Japan Foundation.
On Sunday, Aug. 3rd, we had the opportunity to present a short demonstration of ikebana at The Berkeley (Gladstone St., Halifax), a retirement home for senior citizens.
We would like to thank Pam, one of the residents, for inviting and giving us the opportunity to introduce ikebana to the community at The Berkeley.
There was some animated discussion after the demonstration too. We hope the flowers brought a little extra cheer to the Sunday afternoon.
Afterwards, our gracious host, Pam, showed us around the garden that the residents work on. The flowers beds are set on raised plant boxes so that the ladies would not have to stoop down to tend them. Such wonderful colours there!
We've left the flower arrangements at the residence so that people could enjoy them for a while longer. Thank you everyone for your enthusiastic attention to our demonstration! Thank you to the management and staff at The Berkeley for having us there.
The Halifax Public Gardens organized an ikebana workshop at The Lord Nelson last June 10th.
First, Miyako created these two moribana arrangements on-the-spot to give the participants an idea of what they'd be making.
Next, it was their turn...and the fun really started! :-)
One great thing about having the Public Gardens as a sponsor was that we had an abundant supply of branches! Early morning that day, Miyako had visited the gardens and had "helped" with the pruning. :-)
Image courtesy of Helen MacLean.
Image courtesy of Helen MacLean.
All the participants were intent on learning more about ikebana. They asked many questions and really thought carefully about the placing of the blooms and branches.
Everybody enjoyed!
See the results. Wow! They did not disappoint. Hard to believe everyone was experiencing ikebana only for the first time that night.
By the way, Miyako arrived at the function room early and had a bit of time in her hands so she made a few free-style arrangements to welcome everybody!
Thank you very much to all who joined the workshop. We hope you had an interesting evening. May your interest in ikebana grow further! Thank you Halifax Public Gardens for organizing this event.
All photos by the ikebana shop except where specified. All rights reserved.
It was our first time to do an ikebana demonstration outdoors. It was a bright, warm, sunny day. We were surrounded by wonderful trees. The setting was perfect....
....until the wind started to blow! By normal standards, it was a mildly pleasant breeze. By ikebana standards, it was a bit scary! :-) Those rocks on the table were not ornamental. They were there to keep the table cover from flapping about!
Anyway, Miyako started doing what she did best. At first there were only a few people...
...but not long after, people started to take notice.
Something beautiful was being created here!
And more people came to watch.
Pretty soon, there was a good-sized crowd.
The Public Gardens had let us take some branches from the trees and bushes, like these beautiful rhododendrons. (We added rocks on the kenzan to give it more weight to withstand the wind!)
Also some very lovely crab apple blossoms! Unfortunately, the wind gods were merciless with this arrangement. It got knocked over right after completion! At least people still got a glimpse! :-)
At the end, some curious members of the audience wanted to try using the kenzan!
We thank everyone who spent the afternoon with us. We hope you enjoyed the "show". Thank you to the Halifax Public Gardens, most especially to Ms. Helen MacLean, for making this possible (and for letting us take some of your branches!) Thank you also to Miyako's students who came to offer support. You know who you are!
All photos by the ikebana shop. All rights reserved.
