Blooms as white as a New England winter landscape. These fragile beings seemed perfect subjects for my extended study on impermanence.. During long dark nights in my winter studio, I held them to electric light, appreciated their fleeting beauty and photographed, slowly turning flower stems to emphasize their ephemeral nature.

Quiet moments in Summer gardens…

So many reminders of invisible webs supporting each healthy bloom… beneficial insects, companion plants, soil, sun, rain, and caring humans who intentionally select plants appropriate to local ecology and in extreme weather (heat) give special attention, gardening at night and watering before dawn.

I sold my home gardens so relied on other growers this year. By fall I had learned to appreciate the luxury of free time for direct connections with good people in their gardens and at their growing edges. Without a camera between us all the time, I gathered arms full of their cut flowers.

Young farmers hard work and beautiful results also provided colorful turn in my creative direction into Winter once again.

Heirloom blooms, especially peonies and roses, have to be my favorite memories of the growing season.

This summer I found them in private and public gardens along Maine coast, on historic properties like Strawbery Banke in Portsmouth NH, Tenuta di Spannocchia in Chiusdino, Italy (near Sienna), and Gardd Bodnant Gardens and other National Trust properties around British Isles.