The Japan Federation of Landscape Contractors' Kei Truck Garden Contest challenges people to transform the beds of their miniature pickup trucks into lovely mobile gardens. From Spoon & Tamago:
Other than using the kei truck there are very few limitations and landscapers have incorporated everything from benches and aquariums to elements of lighting into their designs. Judges then rank the entries based on planning, expression, design, execution and environment.
Tiffanie Turner has mastered the art of the paper flower to the point that she can make enormous crepe-paper blooms that still somehow look real. Read the rest
Thomas Blanchard (previously) has returned with a video project called DANCE DANCE. Read the rest
The world looks a lot cooler if you're a bug, as Craig P. Burrows demonstrates in his striking series of flowers shot in ultraviolet-induced visible fluorescence. Read the rest
In the cosmology of bureacratic evil, United Airlines is the prince of Hell.
Minutes before departure, already buckled into her seat, she was ordered to leave the plane. The gate agent told her that her reservation had been canceled. Traveler Help Desk, the online agency that sold the ticket, had rescinded it because the landlord made a change directly through United — even though United had assured the landlord that it was not a problem to do so.
Unable to fly, Ms. Amrich drove through the night, not stopping even to use the bathroom. Her sister, in the hospital room, held a phone to their mother’s ear, and Ms. Amrich begged her to hold on.
She was still driving when her cellphone rang again. Her mother was dead.
I can just see the agent's smile when they told her that “nobody flies for free.”
When she complained, United called her landord, to get her address, to send her flowers.
Previously: • Watch bizarre video: United Airlines employee pushes 71-year-old to floor, leaves him motionless • Fecal rampage grounds international United flight • TSA says it doesn't know why United thought comics were banned from checked Comic-Con luggage Read the rest
Montreal-based clothing designer and artist Raku Inoue has been populating his Instagram with plants and flowers crafted into colorful insects. Read the rest
Ken Hermann went to the flower market in Kolkata, where he snapped these cool portraits of flower sellers with their wares. Read the rest
In Madagascar, botanist Anton Sieder recently discovered an orchid with huge flowers that smell of champagne. Royal Botanic Gardens researcher Johaan Hermans confirmed that the plant, now named Cynorkis christae, is new to science. From The English Garden:
“It is quite a find,” said Johan, who saw the orchid in the flesh in January this year after travelling to the mountains with a team from Kew and Paris. “One of the most noticeable traits of this new orchid is its sweet scent, which one of our team likened to smelling like champagne,” he added.
Cynorkis christae also has enormous flowers, with a 5cm (2in) wide lip and a 16cm (6in) spur. Most of the flower is pure white, while the top petals have distinctive maroon markings...
The plant was named after Anton’s wife Christa, hence Cynorkis christae.
"New Orchids Discovered in Madagascar" (The English Garden via @NadiaMDrake) Read the rest
Alexa Sirbu and Lukas Vojir created flow/er, a lovely animation programmed to mimic growth patterns of flowers. Read the rest
Artist Makoto Azuma thought to himself, “if flowers symbolize Earthly beauty, how can I push nature’s boundaries? How can I transport beauty to where it doesn’t currently exist?” Answer: By tying them to balloons! Read the rest
Diphylleia grayi, the "skeleton flower" is normally opaque white but when it rains, the petals become transparent until the flower dries. Nanotechnologists are developing new materials inspired by the flower's structure that could lead to the likes of new underwater goggles that repel oil. From Mother Nature Network:
Skeleton flowers are native to wooded mountainsides in the colder regions of Japan, and they bloom from mid-spring to early-summer in shady conditions. The plant might be easier to spot if you look for its large, umbrella-shaped leaves. The pearly white (or clear, if it's raining) blossoms top the leaves in small clusters...
A related species, Diphylleia cymosa, can be found in the deciduous forests of the Appalachian Mountains here in the United States.
(via Daily Grail)
Does your garden of earthly delights have room for some out-of-this-world petunias? Night Sky petunias are a cultivar by Selecta, developed in part at Mississippi State University's trial gardens. Read the rest
From Tallahassee, Florida's Lofty Pursuits who offer these "handmade artisinal candies" at $6 for a 2.75oz bag:
A new technique for a new effect in our image candies. These Crystal Roses are formed from nothing but hot sugar, and flavors. This is the first in a series of candies using this kind of design.
Whenever it seems that timelapse has become a bit overused, someone like Jamie Scott refreshes the format with something like Spring, a dizzying film of flowers in bloom. Read the rest
Japanese researchers demonstrated how a tiny remote-controlled drone could help bees pollinate flowers in areas where bees populations have been reduced due to pesticides, climate change, and other factors. Eijiro Myako and his colleagues at the Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology hope that eventually robotic bees could handle their share of the work autonomously. From New Scientist:
The manually controlled drone is 4 centimetres wide and weighs 15 grams. The bottom is covered in horsehair coated in a special sticky gel. When the drone flies onto a flower, pollen grains stick lightly to the gel, then rub off on the next flower visited.
In experiments, the drone was able to cross-pollinate Japanese lilies (Lilium japonicum). Moreover, the soft, flexible animal hairs did not damage the stamens or pistils when the drone landed on the flowers...
“We hope this will help to counter the problem of bee declines,” says Miyako. “But importantly, bees and drones should be used together.”
Flower-bombing is the new yarn-bombing if Geoffroy Mottart has his way. He creates flower crowns and beards for statues around Brussels, then posts his handiwork online. Read the rest
Amorphophallus titanum is known as the "Corpse Flower" because it smells like rotten flesh. The infamous stink attracts flies and beetles that helps it get pollinated. Native to Sumatra, the plant rarely flowers and can take as long as a decade to bloom if it does. The New York Botanical Garden has cultivated a fine Corpse Flower and you can livestream it blooming any time now. Watch the video stream above but don't blink or you may miss it. If only Smell-O-Vision had caught on...
From the NYBG:
Each day of careful tending and feeding has led up to this moment: a brief yet glorious window in which the enormous plant (up to eight feet high) will unfurl, displaying the striking red interior and uncanny scent to which it owes its name. This is the first time that a blooming titan-arum has been put on display at the Garden since 1939, and this unique plant is unpredictable—it may be in flower for only one or two days.
The Corpse Flower (NYBG)
