Cedar of Lebanon - 4

The water soluble fabric is washed out.

and now I am blocking it. This has more areas where things weren't joined so well or extra threads on edges. But I expected it because of the way the trunk and boughs were sewn. I will join things together when I stitch them to a backing after I have trimmed random threads.

Cedar of Lebanon - 3

On Saturday at the Offcuts meeting I finished the stitching on the Cedar of Lebanon. Now it needs to have the soluble stabiliser washed out.

I am pretty happy with this!

Cedar of Lebanon - 2

Now I am 'colouring in' the branches.

Some stitches at angles from the horizontal stitching. These will be covered with stitch, but will help hold the other stitches in place.

one main branch done

I am quite happy with how this looks! I will do the whole thing and then see if it needs any touching up.

Cedar of Lebanon - 1

The bad head is gone today! Phew.

Time for a new tree. I haven't decided backgrounds yet. Wait till I have a few and see what they look like.

Starting a Cedar of Lebanon.
The kind we mostly see here in the UK are big and sprawling old trees. But if they grow in a stand of trees, they grow straight and tall.
Which is why they were much sought after in trade with the country of Lebanon in the times of the Ancients. They were used for building houses, palaces, ships and are especially mentioned as being collected by King David of Israel to be used by his son Solomon when he became King to build the Temple in Jerusalem.

We have a book written by a forester about trees mentioned in the Bible and/or which grow in the Middle East. I am enjoying it for the forestry part (I never thought about a forester's viewpoint of ancient manuscripts!) as much as for the images of trees and what they have been used for.

So, here is the quick outline based on the trees in the photo.

It reminds me a bit of the Sequoias and Redwood Trees in the way the branches grow. We have a few Wellingtonia trees around here that look similar.

And here I have done the work on the trunk. Some areas are 'coloured in' outside the line into the branches part.

I will draw the branches over top those sections. It gives some depth. but is mainly functional so that when the water soluble fabric is dissolved, the tree doesn't come apart at the joining of the different sections.

trees

A couple of the trees at the top of the hill above the actual North Lake of South Hill Park

 

You can see from the trees the past few days that some of them have already been seriously 'trimmed'. The large branches that reached way out and nearly touched the ground at the end have been taken off. Probably 'health and safety'. But I guess within reason...I have seen kids climbing up and swinging on them. and the branch at the trunk is usually around the size of a 'normal' tree. So it could do someone some damage.

 

I do know that some thing more about these trees will get into my work someday.

trees

Two older trees in North Lake - one is a Cedar of Lebanon

trees

Cedar of Lebanon

Another one of the trees in North Lake

trees

Cedar of Lebanon

One of the ones in North Lake

Cedar Tree finish all the way around

A bit late for this today as I have been out all day, and didn't get the photos sorted yesterday. But here are photos of the finished Cedar Tree from the 'front door' of the little tunnel and all the way around.

Looks like there are places they would have attempted if their last day hadn't been cold and mostly tipping with rain. I went and took them a cuppa to say thanks and had a natter about working with wood. (My sis and I earned money for college by cutting and selling pulp wood for the paper mill - Dad cut the trees down and most of the time cut it into 4ft lengths, we did the rest! We also cut birch for people's firewood. and thus the condition of my neck and back!)

Something on Saturday

A few more photos of some of the etchings in the Cedar Tree.

A fox

A waterbird

An owl - waterbird above

These 2 were high up so they are a bit fuzzy, but you can see how they have carved the wood in the midst of a knot and then etched it.

Beautiful.

Something on Saturday

Just a few quick photos from the Cedar Tree. They are finished, but I haven't had a chance to go get good photos of the rest.

On the knots of the tree, they smoothed off the bark and etched these silhouettes into the wood. Very interesting.

deer

night critters

woodpecker

Something on Saturday

The ground has dried up enough that the wood carvers were able to get back to the Cedar Tree this week.

Remember they are carving creatures into the large stump of a Cedar of Lebanon which was destroyed in the winter storms of January 2010. Click on the label Cedar Tree at the bottom of this post to see previous photos.

Here is the snake - I can't tell if they enhanced him in anyway. I know they worked a bit more on the owl.

In the first part of the week there was the start of ? a frog?

Oh, a toad!

They have also covered the bottom of the hole with non-slip surface for the kiddies to go in and out.

Oh, they have started something interesting in there as well!

And look, the outlines of something else...a squirrel? a fox?

Something on Saturday

Last week before the snows came, a bit more progress was made with the Cedar Tree Project. They had to stop on Friday when the snow got too much.

But we have the start of a pretty convincing snake

and on top the beginnings of an owl.

Something on Saturday

A photo of the other side of the Cedar of Lebanon I mentioned last Saturday.

To me it already has a bit of a face and animals lurking in the wood trying to get out!

I think they plan to do a sort of mantle above the opening with little creatures sitting on it. As Pat Kennewell, the lady organising it said, "We want to make it a bit like Alice in Wonderland. Peering through, pretending, playing house..."

Back when the big limbs were chopped off and everything looked bleak, they did plant this little tree. Not sure if it is also a Cedar of Lebanon or something which will be a bit smaller in full growth.

Something on Saturday

We used to have a wonderful Cedar of Lebanon tree on the green near the entrance to our road. I wrote about it when the heavy snow brought great chunks of it down. Early January 2010.

...

Bit by bit they took the huge branches off as they became dangerous. When one fell from the weight of the snow the other day, it took most of the rest with it. So, they took all the rest of the branches down.

Somehow one feels as though there should have been a ceremony of sorts. I loved that tree. I could see it over the tops of the houses next to ours. It was beautiful in the sunset.


Here is a piece I made inspired by it sometime past. It is in the collection of a museum in Southport.

Fast forward to 2012. One of the community go-getter ladies has won lottery funding to get it turned into a play place for children. There will be a way to go through the tree (for playing house) and animals will be carved in some of the limbs that are sticking out.

This week they started the hole! They need to leave it for the wood to cure a bit to see if it creates cracks or anything before they start on the rest.

There are a few steps up to the hole on the other side. They are going to put a fake door on one side, too.

I am so glad. It was so majestic, kids loved to play 'down at the cedar'. I thought at the time 'I hope they do something with it rather than cut it all down.' I am looking forward to the changes.

I think I will do a new piece when it is finished to celebrate the wonderful tree continuing to give joy and pleasure.

I am linking this to Off the Wall Friday at Nina-Marie's. Sometimes creativity is about the beginnings of ideas or about watching other people's creative efforts and being spurred on to your own.

Cedar of Lebanon - final days

I just found out my husband had taken a photo of the Cedar tree last Tues night when the big snow started. This is before a good portion of the right of the tree came down, which prompted its removal.


I adapted the photo a bit to compensate for the blur and darkness.

As you can see it was very majestic. You felt as though it would carry on being there longer than you would be.
and how it looks now.

There were several of these trees around the neighbourhood. It would have been interesting to plot the layout. I think they must have had something to do with the landscaping of the grounds when this area was part of the estate for the mansion at South Hill Park.

Other events -Today I braved the snow to go collect my nephew from Heathrow airport. Funny thing was, the minute you got out of Bracknell onto the motorways, the driving was fine! i had loaded us up with a flask of tea, snacks, shovel, extra warm things, etc! Oh well.

My nephew was passing through from a trip with his university to the Middle East and was able to get a couple days extension. He has to be back at uni in America on Wed, but even a couple days is better than nothing when you don't see someone for years on end.