Sunday, April 5, 2009

lion in the sky



when you walk alone, like i do sometimes, your imagination starts to wonder and sometimes it plays tricks on you. today, i was walking along a track at the dairy farm nature park, when i thought i saw a dancing lion up in the trees.

if you are imaginative enough, you can see the lion with it mouth open, with something trailing from its mouth. it also has a bushy tail and it is balancing itself on two legs, just like the lion in the chinese lion dance.

this is not one of those manicured shrubs that is shaped by constant trimming. it takes shape naturally. so, man could have learnt from nature and then develop the art of topiary. but man need tools, like the hand shears and pruner, to shape the sculpture. nature does not even need wires to guide in forming the shape and also, there is no need for tieing.

topiary is the art of trimming and shaping hedges into an array of shapes and sizes in order to add an artistic touch to the garden.




how about this? does it not look like a butterfly? i came across this along the pang sua park connector, which will link zhenghua park to choa chu kang park. the connector is still under construction.



then, there was this nature sculpture at admiralty park. it looks like an elephant with a morning glory flower for an eye.

the most basic way to start with topiary is to fashion a rough wire frame in the desired shape. once this is done, secure it in place and begin to train the plant around the shape.

5 comments:

Yu-Kym said...

Yes it looks like a lion!!!

yg said...

hi yu-kym, thanks for being a follower and for visiting my blog. incidentally, i have a sister called yew kim; her name sounds like yours.

professor said...

YG
have u tried to walk inside the reservoir at Chestnut Ave?

yg said...

hi professor, the chestnut ave waterworks is a protected place and it is all fenced up; i visited the waterworks long ago but i have not gone for walk inside that place.
however, we are planning to walk from chestnut ave to the peirce reservoir soon.

Yu-Kym said...

Hi YG, what a coincidence! it's the same pronounciation! haha. i like your blog! i realise that there are many places in SG which i haven't been to and makes me wanna go exploring!