i62o The Cornell Reading Courses 



The nature of the plant growth should suggest the manner of arrange- 

 ment. Branches of trees should be arranged so that their strong, rugged 

 character is preserved. Vines should appear to run or droop or climb. 

 When grace and delicacy distinguish plants these characteristics should 

 not be lost in arrangement. 



Whole plants, such as the primrose (Fig. 22), the cyclamen, and many 

 bulbs, such as daffodils, jonquils, and tulips, furnish a ready-made arrange- 

 ment difficult to equal. Violets or hcpaticas, ripple grass or dandelions, 

 carefully selected and sometimes judiciously pruned, are charming (Fig. 21). 

 One bit of sod from a New England pasture has been known to furnish 

 ten varieties of i:)lants, and is a wild garden in itself. Taken early in 

 March and brought into the favoring warmth of the house, it is a prophecy 

 of the spring easily read by a family of children, who receive thereby 

 a vision of the beauty of a little grass plant not so easily perceived when 

 the plants comx in battalions. 



The life histor}^ of the plant may be implied by flower, bud, and pod, 

 as in the poppy (Fig. 24), or the habitat may be suggested, as in 

 the arrangement of buttercups and grasses (Fig. 26). Clover and daisies 

 also feel at home among the grasses, as do poppies and cornflowers in the 

 grain. Water plants are in their element literally when arranged in a 

 large, flat bowl of water. Other plants whose attraction is in their form 

 of growth look well in such a receptacle, for the broad, low lines, in the 

 case of land plants, stand for the ground (Fig. 18). The perforated glass 

 holders (Fig. 1 1 , f), which may be obtained at almost any department store, 

 are very helpful in such arrangements. By means of these or the Japanese 

 supports (Fig. 13, front center) in the bottom of a jardiniere, it is possible 

 to make more characteristic arrangements with fewer branches than it has 

 been the custom to employ. The use of these and other ingenious siip- 

 ports for the stems is an art in Japan, where the arrangement of flowers 

 has its literature and professors and is considered no mean employment 

 for persons in the highest ranks of society. Just such effects may be 

 obtained b}^ strips of lead bent in various ways, by filling the bowl or the 

 receptacle with sand or small stones, or by using forked or split sticks 

 fitted tightly across the bowl or the vase so as to hold the stem or the 

 branches threaded through them firmly in place. 



THE RELATION OF FLOWER ARRANGEMENT TO THE PRINCIPLES OF DESIGN 



It is a matter of common experience that a thoughtful combining of 

 objects or materials will in general be more satisfactory than a thoughtless, 

 haphazard one. When order, reason, and thought for the finished effect 

 control any arrangement, the result becomes what is technically called a 

 design. Any one may learn to apply design to such ever^'da}- problems 



