Plant of the Month : Crocosmia

Montbretia - or Crocosmia which is her botanic name (Crocosmia x crocosmiiflora) -  has a home in South Africa but thrives in our gardens in Germany if she has enough water and receives  protection from strong frosts in winter. Wet sand seems to be her favourite substrate. 

I saw her first years ago out in the wild on the west coast of Ireland where she grows like weed, escaped from garden settings. We were sitting on a sandy wet cold beach in a large bay in the southwest of Ireland. Around us these long green leaves were shooting up everywhere and  even grew down close to saltwater's edge. I gathered a few corms that were floating around in the salty puddles and took them home with me in my sponge bag.  Since then I have bought several other cultivars. 
They come in various colours from red over orange to yellow.  

This is the commonest kind, which goes by the name "Lucifer"  

A nice strong colour until September with an interesting eyecatching erect shape of leaves in combination with purples from Sedums and Eupatorium, next to  the Judas tree Cercis canadensis "Forest Pansy". 

A few years ago during my garden trip through the South of England I found a cultivar with the name "Paul's Yellow": it started flowering last month and keeps going for a month. In this year's heat its flowers have turned out surprisingly resilient. 

"Paul's Yellow"

Blickachsen 2017

Hard to believe but it has been two years since the last Blickachsen Exhibition in my home town Bad Homburg  ( Blickachsen 2015 ). And who would have thought that I would maintain this blog up till now and find something to write about each week? 

"Untitled (schräge Bank)" -  Markus Wilfling

"DN100 Stadtmöbel"

Bad Homburg's Kurpark is full of resting benches - it is a nice theme to work on as one can see from the works of Wilfling and Pitsch&Schau .... This huge bench is made from drainage pipe.

A large gherkin: "Der Gurk" - Erwin Wurm

.... the severely cut back yews on either side might but don't belong to the exhibition. 

 another large gherkin-like structure ... "Roter Keil" - Johann Feilacher

"Kreisgruppe" - Joannis Avramidis

"Kopf im Kopf" - Alfred Haberpointner

This is not a photoshop distortion but a very ingeniously crafted sculpture.

"Isabella" - Jaume Plensa

"Big Be-Hide" - Alicja Kwade

"Blue Hour" - Raul Walch

Why does this remind me of Bhutan? 

"7 Anrufungen" - Karl Prantl

"Pavillon de Vin" - Joana Vasconcelos

"Placements" - Manfred Wakolbinger

"Three Equal Volumes" - Ewerdt Hilgemann

These three rather cold stainless steel installations led to my most interesting organic monochrome abstract photographs.

On the opening day young ladies in historic costumes offered drinks from Bad Homburg's mineral springs.  

Photographic Garden Diary: Fallen Leaves

Colours have left our garden now. The fallen leaves of the red maple make up for the lack of flowers  but will soon fade. They decorate the dark green hellebore leaves and Cornus canadensis and whatever else they land on.

These pictures are for my father who received an Alzheimer's diagnosis these weeks like so many old people nowadays, 20% of the over 80ies. From his symptoms, it was to be expected, but we hope that we can delay the more severe manifestations for a bit. It is a cruel disease that destroys but does not kill. Therefore, in a sombre mood, a few pictures of the Bad Homburg Kurpark in autumn, where he used to walk.