I’ve always known the Yokohama Nursery was no ordinary horticultural business but exploring the internet recently I came across site after site showing ravishing woodcuts of peonies and maples and irises taken from catalogues sent out from this nursery one hundred years ago. They are some of the loveliest woodcuts I’ve ever seen and one site mentions them as some of the finest graphic design work ever done.
Enkianthus perulatus
Dodantsutsu
In a few days we will have colour in yet another tree sent from Yokohama, the big Nikko Maple, Acer maximowiczianum at the end of the Upper Meadow. This rare tree turns pink and gold in mid-May. Two Paperbark Maples, Acer griseum, near the lower meadow turn gold and rosy-red days later and when one checks these species are closely related! The show doesn’t stop there! We have a selected form of Liquidamber formosana which turns warm-burgundy and holds this colour all through winter. This choice tree grows near the Belgium fence above the potager garden.
Acer maximowiczianum
Acer griseum
Liquidamber formosana
See you in the garden – Jeremy Francis
