Last Sunday’s Halloween Hoorah at the Garden was a hit, as shown in these photos taken by Gayle Schmidt, Coordinator of Public Education. As children entered the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, they turned a cotton ball and tissue into a ghost to hang in the Ghoulish Garden. And, of course, no Halloween celebration would be complete without a fancy jack-o-lantern, carved on the spot in the Benenson Ornamental Conifers.

Looking for something fun to do this evening? Enjoy Kiku and Cocktails, viewing the exhibition Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Chrysanthemum beautifully lit and listening to a dramatic performance by Taiko Masala drummers.

And if you’re searching for weekend ideas, click on the links below.

Check out Saturday’s programming.

Check out Sunday’s programming.

Rustin Dwyer is Visual Media Production Specialist at The New York Botanical Garden.

Kiku Bamboo Sculpture Installation from The New York Botanical Garden on Vimeo.

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Autumn is here and Kiku returns to The New York Botanical Garden from October 18 through November 16. Time to perform your “civic duty” and vote…for your favorite kiku style.

Is it the majestic dome-shaped array of the ozukuri (“thousand bloom”)? Could it be the colorful kengai (“cascade”) that resemble “waterfalls” of wild chrysanthemums? How about the towering ogiku (“single stem”) arranged in symbolic rows representing the colors of the horse bridles of Japan’s Imperial family? Maybe it’s this year’s new display style, shino-tsukuri (“driving rain”)?

Click the images on the poll to learn more about each variety and then choose your favorite. (P.S. You can vote as many times as you want. We won’t tell anyone!) Spread the word and get others to vote, too. Then, come visit Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Chrysanthemum and see the impressive cultural exhibition and flower show first-hand.

The polling widget will live on the upper right corner of the blog until Election Week (the first week of November), when we will announce the results.

Sally Armstrong Leone is Editorial Director at The New York Botanical Garden.

The Courtyards of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory are abuzz with staff, designers, and volunteers creating and installing the upcoming exhibition Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Chrysanthemum. Four elaborate growing styles of chrysanthemums (kiku) make up the focal point of the show. These exquisite displays are housed in Japanese garden pavilions known as uwaya, intricate structures of bamboo and cedar delicately edged with ceremonial drapery that provide both shelter and a formal stage for kiku. The uwaya featured in the Garden’s exhibition were crafted by Tom Owens, President of High Country Timberframe & Gallery Woodworking in Boone, North Carolina, who recently talked about the design and construction for the show.

How are the structures that you made for the Botanical Garden different from those that are made in Japan?
In Japan uwaya are newly built each year for the annual Chrysanthemum Exhibition. The NYBG challenge was to provide traditional structures that could potentially be re-used for many years. That is, the design and construction techniques had to utilize traditional Japanese joinery, proportion, details, and materials while also facilitating the safe and orderly disassembly and storage of the pavilion components during the winter, spring, and summer months.

What was the production process like?
More than 4,000 man hours were spent from inception to raising to disassembly. Our crew of eight carpenters and I traveled to a bamboo farm in Charlotte, N.C., to harvest thousands of fresh bamboo poles by hand. Once cut, we brought them back to our shop and carefully cleaned and polished the poles and cut them to the required length before assembly into the uwaya. All of the timber layout, joinery work, and finishing took place in our shop in Boone. Upon completion, we pre-assembled the more intricate joinery to ensure proper fit and then, once final adjustments were made, sent the hundreds of components wrapped in paper via tractor trailer to NYBG for installation.

Can you explain how the uwaya used for the kengai* style is different from the uwaya used for the other styles? What is the significance?
The kengai uwaya differs significantly by relying primarily on a bamboo lattice to support its multi-tiered roof system. The materials are also much more varied and natural in their shapes. The post-and-beam elements of all uwaya are exposed, contributing their beauty, but the kengai is particularly spectacular as its materials are so rich and textured, providing striking contrasts with the cascading flowers. It is a building with a lot of soul!

*The kengai (cascade) style features hundreds of small-flowered chrysanthemums trained on a framework that is angled to evoke flowers growing down the face of a cliff.

Karen Daubmann is Director of Exhibitions and Seasonal Displays.

Last year, as one of my first projects as an employee of the Garden, I had the pleasure of working with artist Tetsunori Kawana as he and a crew of staff and volunteers (see photo below) assembled a bamboo sculpture for Kiku: The Art of the Japanese Chrysanthemum. The exhibition focuses on luscious displays of chrysanthemums but uses bamboo, maples, and other Japanese plants to showcase how important plants are to the Japanese, especially in autumn.

The towering sculpture provided a magnificent accent to last year’s Kiku display in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory Courtyards. If you saw the sculpture, I’m sure you’ll agree with me that it was very cool and like nothing you’d seen before. Though it was untitled, I’d compare it to a bamboo volcano, a wide base narrowing at the top but giving way to an explosion of bamboo strands that danced through the air, rugged and powerful but graceful at the same time.

This year, Kawana-san is back with a bigger and even cooler project. He has designed what he calls a “cloud forest,” which visitors can walk through to experience it from within, immersing themselves in his work.
On Monday, 350 pieces of 30-foot timber bamboo (Phyllostachys bambusoides) arrived here from Georgia. As the truck was unloaded, the excitement for the project began to build. The bamboo will be used in many ways—cut into sections to form triangles of support, split into segments and woven to create “clouds,” and used full length to create the “forest.”

Unless you’re a volunteer working on this project, you’ll have to wait until the show opens for the sculpture’s unveiling. However, if you’re willing to spend some time sawing, splitting, and wiring bamboo together and you are available October 2–11, please contact the volunteer office at volunteer@nybg.org or 718-817-8564.

Believe me, it is a treat to work alongside Tetsunori Kawana.