“Come, Spring”
“I began Noh no Ikebana more than 35 years ago. First, I joined the class given by a master of Noh no Ikebana, Toshie Yokoi, from an agricultural cooperative in Higashi Chita (JA Aichi Chita) at her visit at our female members’ group event. When she made some adjustments, vegetables in my arrangement suddenly looked so beautiful, fresh and lively. That moved me a lot I remember. Soon, I joined the club of the female members in Agui. Currently, the club has 19 members, but it’ll be nice if we can have some younger members, too.
I always look for the materials for my arrangements, while I’m at my farm and also on the way from home to the farm and vice versa. One day, I find a sweet potato with a funny divided tip and instantly thought, happily, “this would be good for my arrangement.” Any vegetable can be a good material for Noh no Ikebana, and that’s a fun part of it.
This is a joint arrangement made of the materials that our club members brought from home today. We used field mustard, which was blooming only a little withstanding this cold winter, and a branch of a plum tree to express how we long for the coming of the spring.”
<Container> a basin and a bamboo basket
<Materials> a plum tree branch, a kumquat branch, a head of broccoli, aloe, white daikon radishes, carrots, a red cabbage, rice stalks, a Chinese yam, and field mustard