Fall Color in February?

Japanese maple in full fall color. Though you can only see part of the base of the trunk, still, you can get a pretty good idea just how powerful this tree is; with or without leaves. This photo and all the photos in this post are from Luis Vallejo’s Bonsai Studio (Bonsai Estudio), at the Bonsai Museum Alcobendas. It’s sunny and about five Fahrenheit (-15 celsius) this morning. A little early to get our hopes up, but we can dream. Meanwhile here’s some color to fuel those dreams (fall color, but who’s choosy?). All the photos in this post are … Continue reading Fall Color in February?

Powerful Bonsai with Brilliant Deadwood

A great tree for a study in deadwood. It’s a Juniper procumben from Luis Vallejo’s website. I cropped the photo a bit, but you can see the full size original just below. I just spent the last digital hour or so wandering around Luis Vallejo’s Bonsai Studio (Estudio de Bonsai) and his Bonsai Museum (Museo del Bonsai). Sometimes it’s hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. Without raving too much about what Luis has been up to, we’ll just encourage you to pay him a visit (his website and his fb photos). Given just how prolific Luis … Continue reading Powerful Bonsai with Brilliant Deadwood

Bonsai Wiring Lesson

Front view of a freshly trimmed and wired Scot’s pine (Pinus sylvestris) by Luis Vallejo. This photo and the others shown here are from Luis’ facebook feed. It’s not often we find good bonsai technique photos on facebook, so I got a little excited when I stumbled across a whole bunch of great photos of a freshly wire Scot’s pine by Luis Vallejo and thought you might like to see them too. I won’t attempt to show all of Luis’ photos in the series. You can make the short journey to his facebook feed if you’d like to see them. … Continue reading Bonsai Wiring Lesson

Still Crazy…

It’s hard to deny the mind stopping power and originality of this bonsai. It’s by Luis Vila and the photo is by Salvador De Los Reyes. We pinched it from Empire Bonsai (apologies to Salvador and Empire for our crop; we wanted to maximize the tree). I usually try to come up with a good excuse for resorting to our archives (rather than going to the trouble to come up with something new), but today there’s no good excuse. Unless you think laziness qualifies. This post originally appeared in November 2013. It was titled ‘Crazy Bonsai.’ Beyond laziness, another reason … Continue reading Still Crazy…

Comparisons Are Odious, But Still…

European black pine (Pinus nigra) by Mauro Stemberger. I took the liberty to crop this photo (the uncropped version is below) and to brighten it up a bit (the other photos in this post too). All of the photos here are from The Bonsai Blog of Sandor Papp. The bonsai shown here all appeared at the 2014 Noelanders Trophy in Belgium. The photos were taken from The Bonsai Blog of Sandor Papp. They represent a small sampling of Sandor’s Noelander’s photos. Whenever I see photos of the some of the best European bonsai I can’t help but compare them with … Continue reading Comparisons Are Odious, But Still…

Invisible (& Visible) Bonsai

Aside from the fact that this is a remarkable bonsai, there’s the play of light and shadow on the wall. Though I didn’t set out to chose photos with shadows, because there are so many great trees to chose from, it seems like a good way to narrow it down a bit. The photo is from Segundo Congreso y Concurso de Bonsai via Bonsai Fachforum. The remarkable bonsai you see here turned up on Bonsai Fachforum, a German language site that is overflowing with photos of great trees. The Spanish language poster (see below) says Segundo Congreso y Concurso de … Continue reading Invisible (& Visible) Bonsai

Bonsai Muscle

European olives are often resplendent with character as well as muscle and this one is certainly no exception. I found it on flickr and then, one thing led to another and to the conclusion that this tree belongs to Luis Vallejo (though I couldn’t find evidence on his very attractive site). Fair warning I mentioned this last time, but just in case you missed it: I’m out of town and busy with things too numerous to mention, so we’ll dig into our archives once again. This digging should last about two weeks and then we’ll get back to fresh posts. … Continue reading Bonsai Muscle

Fishing for Bonsai Muscle

European olives are often resplendent with character as well as muscle and this one is certainly no exception (to say the least). I found it on flickr and then, one thing led to another (see Gone fishing below) and to the conclusion that this tree belongs to Luis Vallejo (though I couldn’t find evidence on his very attractive but oh-so-slow site). Bonsai muscle There’s something grand about bonsai with thick, powerful trunks. Assuming that I’m not the only one that feels this way, here are three exceptional bonsai (that also happen to be quite muscular) for your enjoyment. Gone fishing … Continue reading Fishing for Bonsai Muscle