What to Expect at 'Kiku Matsuri'
I present one of my first large scale designs since my masterclass 'Bloom Up' with Tom de Houwer. I'm amazed at how all volunteers could capture the way I saw my design in my head. At the Japanese Garden in Hasselt, Belgium, you can visit 'Kiku Matsuri', Chrysanthemum Festival with a theme: Haiku in Bloom. Haiku, an unrhymed poetic form consisting of 17 syllables arranged in three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables respectively. The haiku first emerged in Japanese literature during the 17th century, as a terse reaction to elaborate poetic traditions, though it did not become known by the name Haiku, until the 19th century. 
This Haiku originally was written in Flemish according to the Haiku rules, but freely translated in English it sounds like this:
I turn off the lamplight and my heart becomes a ravine in the moonlight
The Story Behind My Design
The text came to me in a very special moment of my life, it actually mirrors my recent mood which feels like a tormented soul with a harmonious aspect.
The elements that I immediately envisioned were the moonlight and the combination of ravine/heart as a feeling, deep inside, that could be lighted by the moonlight. Japanese culture is full of zen components such as circles which I used to create the heart. I took advantage of the structure's depth to express the ravine concept, and the color palette I have chosen is what in popular imaginary represents a heart's color. But I also decided to make a transition between a few color tones to represent the effects of the moonlight. The white birch bark is a botanical that best suited the idea of moonlight, the structure, and the design. 
My efforts have been focused on giving unity and harmony to the design, I hope you will enjoy the story behind my Haiku in Bloom. 
