Monday, September 21, 2009

go native!


ok, i know i haven't blogged in a while, it's all because my camera was kidnapped to halifax and without a camera i feel lost. words?! i'm not a good writer! my blog is about plants plants don't talk and i don't have to talk to them to enjoy them.

nonetheless. now that i am without a camera i will attempt to catch you up on some happenings... and borrow a photo from the botanical garden.

just yesterday i was at the botanical garden learning all about butterfly friendly plants. yes, it's true, many of the host plants for butterflies tend to be on the weedy and even invasive side. a perfect example is fennel. fennel came to california from asia and spread to become one of the more weedy of the weedy. fennel is now the favorite host plant of the anise swallowtail butterfly. well interestingly enough there is a california native host plant and it is called Yampah (Perideridia kellogii). Not only is Yampah an important food source for the anise swallowtail, but it was also an important food source for California Native Peoples.

And to make matters best, we do sell Perideridia sp. at the Botanical Garden-- it's a plant rarely found in nurseries.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

more from the green gala- these ones by david gilbert

OCELOT: hand dyed using itajime shibori technique in San Francisco
Jonathan David Baker's multi-directionally pleated dress made with seaweed and organic cotton, tux jacket made with recycled nylon and recycled tire rubber
TINC: designed by Savannah Knoop made with sea weed and wood pulp, peace silk, and organic cotton canvas
ashley helvey's d felted organic wool dress from a predator friendly farm
the moon: lace pillow lava dress: vintage slip, lace bits, silk and cotton handkerchiefs, napkins and doilies. annatto dyed silk shirts over dyed with black walnut hull
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painting with plant & earth pigments

gorgeous indigo paints. the lighter circles were tinted with titanium dioxide
adding yellow ochre to the dragon's blood
madder
our materials
the muller- "if it's not mulled, it's not paint"

Last night was part 2 of a 3 part course i hosted at the uc botanical garden at berkeley. judi pettite, a local painter who uses only natural pigments, was our teacher. we experimented with reds, oranges blues and greens using plants such as : madder, dragon's blood (a resin from a number of trees), goldenrod, cosmos, woad, indido. we also used the precious lapis lazuli and ochre- a natural earth pigment. mixing these pigments with gum arabic and grinding them with a muller we made paints. it was such a satisfying and beautiful process.