This image is not what it seems. Take a closer look. These pleached hornbeams are not growing atop a trellis: they are growing on trunks woven together. This practice, dubbed ‘Treedome’ or ‘Arborsculpture’ by creators Konstantin Kirsch and Richard Reames, blends together living matter to create stunning and surreal plant sculptures. Richard Reames talks us through his practice of arborsculpture.
To grow an arborsculpture all one needs is a few young trees a plan and a place to plant them. For example an arch way where 2 trees are grafted together at the apex, is a simple form that creates an astounding entry to any garden. Once the trees have grown tall enough to reach each other when bent, they are grafted together by wounding the two trees where they touch and binding them together with stretch tape. The trees will grow together, then one leader is removed eventually creating one tree with two trunks.
I grew up in the Santa Cruz mountains of California, where as a child I visited the Tree Circus grown by Axel Erlandson. His work with trees inspired me try to pick up where he left off, when he died in 1964. Today his trees are the center pieces of Gilroy Gardens in Gilroy California.
After publishing my first book on the subject “How to Grow a Chair” in 1995 I was contacted by people from all over the world who were eager to share other examples of tree shaping. The oldest reference is a painting from 1516, I dicoverd a Chair in Wisconsin in 1919 and learned about a small handful of people scattered around the world practicing today.
In 2005 I published my second book Arborsculpture- Solutions for a Small Planet. The book is filled with the stories, interviews and “how to” information to help you get started in creating your own unique trees.
For more information, please visit Richard’s website.
