As the Hakuju-En Nursery's focus is Shohin, it would be fitting to continue the progression articles with a Shohin progression. This Shohin Japanese Black Pine Bonsai had been in my collection since early 2017, and while initially I liked the style, and continued to focus on this tree's initial style, I had a change of heart, and here are the photos to recount that change.
June 2017
September 2017
In September 2018 I took this tree into the workshop to see if I could get a final design established in one sitting. The taper was a huge aspect for me to tackle, as well as the form and design.
While this may look like a nice design, this truck line lacks taper and the movement, while good, offers little in the way of building a final structure.
While working in Japan I learnt to try and make any bonsai as small as possible, so for this tree I explored the idea of cutting it right down:
I formulated a plan to reduce this tree almost to Mame size bonsai (under 10 cm) to really get the miniature shape happening. First I would have to cut the trunk down and make a jin. Then needle pluck, and select the buds I will use to make the design. The end result looked like this:
After some time I had the chance to photograph it with a DSLR camera
Some time later in summer the tree had grown out and decandled:
Japanese Black pine bonsai can look quite sparse right after decandling, however if you have kept up your feeding regime set out in my blog: https://hakujuenbonsai.com/blogs/blog/autumn-blog you will see back budding within a week or two.
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