Chinese flower arranging

What it is

The Chinese arranger tries to keep the look of a plant growing in the wild. Stems lean and twist as they would on a hillside. Odd numbers are preferred, symmetry is avoided, and one or two kinds of plant are enough. The vessel is part of the piece. Bronze vessels, porcelain vases, baskets, shallow basins and lengths of bamboo each suit different flowers and seasons. An arrangement often sits beside a painting, a rock or an incense burner on the scholar's desk.

Where it comes from

Flowers were placed in water before images of the Buddha in China from early in the first millennium. Under the Tang and Song dynasties, arranging flowers became a refined skill. Song writers listed it alongside burning incense, preparing tea and hanging paintings as one of the arts of a cultivated life. In the late Ming, around 1600, the writer Yuan Hongdao set out the rules of taste in a short book on vases and flowers. It was later read closely in Japan as well as in China.

What it means

Each plant carries a message. Plum blossom, which flowers in the cold, stands for endurance. The peony stands for wealth and honour, the lotus for purity, the chrysanthemum for a long and quiet life. Orchid, bamboo, chrysanthemum and plum together are called the four gentlemen. Arrangements for the lunar new year combine plants whose names sound like good wishes. Paper white narcissus, pussy willow and peach blossom are common in homes and flower markets at that time.

How to take part

1. Choose a narrow necked vase and one branch with a strong natural line.
2. Add at most one or two flowers and keep an odd number of stems.
3. Let the branch lean out of the vase instead of standing straight.
4. Before the lunar new year, visit a flower market in a Chinese city to see the seasonal plants.

The flowers

Prunus mumeThe fragrant plum blossom tree that blooms in winter across East AsiaPeonyLarge spring flowers in pink, red, white, yellow and purple, grown in gardens worldwideSacred lotusThe pink aquatic flower sacred in Asia and grown for food, worship and beautyChrysanthemumAutumn-blooming flower with thousands of varieties, cherished in East Asia and beyondPaperwhiteA tall, white-and-yellow narcissus grown for scent and indoor blooms

Also part of it, and being written: Cymbidium, Bamboo.

Sources and further reading

• Chinese flower arrangement on Wikipedia