Peter Warren @ Willowbog Part 1

Now that I’ve shared photos of the Willowbog Collection, I’ll move on to some photos taken on the Saturday during a workshop with Peter Warren.

As a spectator, I was able to float about and get some nice shots of the action. Here’s the day in pictures.

Peter talking to yet another Peter about the options on his raw material Larch. At least this Peter wasn’t wearing crocs, an abnormality on the weekend 🙂

Dave gets to work on his yamadori Common Juniper cascade. Don’t adjust your screens, he really was that tanned!!

Mr Snart surveys the tree in question.

Janice talks to Peter about her little juniper seeking advice.

Roberts workshop tree, a little Chinese Juniper.

Thinning out before Robert gets wiring.

Further discussions about Peters Larch.

Steve gets stuck into a little Larch, one of several trees brought along for tweaking.

Everyone gets to work.

My favourite workshop photo of the weekend. Willowbog head buck cat watches proceedings 🙂

Alan, a local artist, took a quick sketch of Peter working on Dave’s Juniper. Note his great portrayal of the crocs 😉

Work finished for now on the Common Juniper. This tree was in amazing health as all Dave’s trees seem to be. The growth at the apex has been refined but extension growth at the cascading tip has been left long to allow branches to thicken.

This beautiful cascade with unusual deadwood reminded me of a juniper I had seen in a book or magazine a few years back. Peter Snart was able to show me a photo of it that evening. Of course I can’t now remember who owned it. Was it a Dutch of Belgian guy?

Final tweaking on Robert little Shohin Juniper.

A busy day with a lot of trees receiving different work to suit to the needs of the tree and the owner. Peter is quick to pass on advice on the future care and techniques required for each tree to allow it to reach it’s maximum potential. I was interested to see that he wanted each participant to get what they needed from each tree, not what he, as teacher, could have imposed. A different approach to others that I’ve seen. It certainly makes the participants more involved with the design. In some cases options were left on trees to allow the individual to make a decision in their own time.